
(ilass 
Book_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 



HISTORY OF INDIANA 




INDIANA TERRITORY, ISOO, By E. V. SHOCKLEY 



A HISTORY OF INDIANA 

FROM ITS EXPLORATION 
TO 1850 



LOGAN ESAREY, Ph. D. 

'I 

Instructor in Western History in Indiana University 




W. K. STEWART CO. 

INDIANAPOLIS 
1915 






Copyright, 1915 
BY LOGAN ESAREY 



MAR iOi9!5 
^CI,A393931 



PREFACE 



IN the preparation of this book several unexpected ob- 
stacles have been met. In the first place many traditional 
stories popularly regarded as substantial history have been 
found to be without historical foundation. In the second 
place there is no considerable collection of historical mate- 
rial to draw upon. Other States have published their docu- 
mentary materials and thus made them available to his- 
torians, but that work remains to be done in Indiana. In 
the third place many of the State publications have been 
found, after close study, to be unreliable, others are bound 
without indexes, tables of contents, or even continuous pag- 
ination. In many cases it is necessary to turn through a 
record, page by page, to find any desired information. 
These conditions have made it necessary to found every ma- 
terial statement on a primary source. Such work is slow 
and very tedious. 

Indiana University, 
October 30, 1914. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 

1 The Jesuits Plan a Nation of Christian 

Indians 1 

2 The Fur Traders 3 

3 Louis XIV and the Mississippi Valley. __ 8 

4 The Miami Indians 10 

5 The First Settlements in Indiana 14 

6 The French Settlers 22 

CHAPTER II THE ENGLISH PERIOD, 1764-1779 28 

7 English Conquest and Government 28 

8 PoNTiAc's War 31 

9 The Journey of George Croghan 37 

10 England Takes Possession and Organizes 

the Country 40 

CHAPTER III THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA, 

1778-1779 47 

11 The American Revolution and the In- 

dians 47 

12 The Capture of Kaskaskia 48 

13 Pierre Gibault and the Capture of Vin- 

CENNES 52 

14 The Last Capture of Vincennes 59 

15 Civil Government Under Virginia 67 

CHAPTER IV CLOSING CAMPAIGNS OF THE 

REVOLUTION 70 

16 Indians of Indiana 70 

17 Last Stage of the Revolutionary War 

in the West 78 

18 The Indians Become the Wards of the 

United States 89 



vi TABLE OF CONTENTS 

CHAPTER V INDIAN WARS, 1790-1796 92 

19 The Struggle for the Ohio River Boun- 

dary 92 

20 The Conquest of the Miamis 104 

21 A Year of Negotiations and the End of 

the War 120 

CHAPTER VI GOVERNMENT OF THE NORTH- 
WEST TERRITORY 126 

22 Organization of the Northwest Terri- 

tory 126 

23 The Government at Marietta 130 

24 Vincennes Land Claims 132 

25 Indiana a Part of Knox County 137 

26 Government Under the Judges 138 

27 Civil Government of the Northwest 

Territory 142 

28 Harrison in Congress 151 

CHAPTER Vll INDIANA TERRITORY, 1800-1816 154 

29 Organization of Indiana Territory 154 

30 Indiana Made a Territory of the Second 

Grade 159 

31 The Territorial Legislature 169 

32 Aaron Burr's Conspiracy 177 

33 Development of the Territory 178 

CHAPTER VIII INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 

1812 181 

34 After the Treaty of Greenville 181 

35 Tippecanoe 186 

36 Indian Wars of the Frontier 190 

37 Life on the Frontier 198 

CHAPTER IX FROM TERRITORY TO STATE, 

1813-1816 203 

38 New Settlements 203 

39 Removal of the Territorial Capital to 

Corydon, 1813 210 



TABLE OF CONTENTS vii 

40 The Enabling Act 213 

41 The Constitutional Convention of 1816_ 217 

CHAPTER X THE STATE GOVERNMENT AT 

CORYDON, 1816-1825 222 

42 The New Constitution in Operation 222 

43 The Indians 228 

44 First State Bank and the Ohio Falls 

Canal 233 

45 Moving the Capital to Indianapolis, 

1825 237 

46 Settlement of the New Purchase 239 

47 Social and Political Organization 248 

CHAPTER XI ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, 

1825-1835 254 

48 Early Roads 254 

49 The Michigan Road 257 

50 Stage Lines 261 

51 Opening the Streams to Navigation 263 

52 The Flatboat Trade 269 

53 Early Mail Service 272 

54 Settlement of the Wabash Country 273 

CHAPTER XII RELIGION AND EDUCATION IN 

EARLY INDIANA 279 

55 Churches 279 

56 Education 289 

CHAPTER XIII POLITICS FROM 1825 TO 1840__ 296 

57 The Jacksonian Party 296 

58 The Internal Improvement Party 304 

59 The Harrison Campaigns 311 

CHAPTER XIV REMOVAL OF THE INDIANS 

FROM THE STATE 323 

60 The Treaty Grounds 323 

61 Black Hawk's War, 1832 325 

62 Removal of the Miamis and Pottawat- 

TOMIES 332 



viii TABLE OF CONTENTS 

CHAPTER XV THE PUBLIC LANDS IN IN- 
DIANA 340 

63 The Survey, Its Methods and Area 340 

64 Land Offices 342 

65 Land Sales 344 

CHAPTER XVI SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IM- 
PROVEMENTS 352 

66 The Problem, the People, and the Legis- 

lature 352 

67 The Wabash and Erie Canal 355 

68 The System of 1836 360 

69 Construction of Canals and Roads 366 

70 The Settlement With the Creditors 378 

71 Finishing the Wabash and Erie Canal__ 385 

CHAPTER XVII THE SECOND BANK OF IN- 
DIANA 394 

72 Chartering the Bank in 1834 394 

73 Organization and Policy of the Bank 399 

74 The Panic of 1837 403 

75 The Era of Free Banks 408 

76 Bank of the State of Indiana — The 

Third State Bank, 1855-1865 413 

CHAPTER XVIII THE PIONEERS AND THEIR 

SOCIAL LIFE 418 

77 The People 418 

78 Home Life and Customs 421 

79 Occupations 424 

80 The First Public Utilities 428 

81 Festivals and Festivities 429 

82 Sickness and Physicians 432 

83 State Charities 435 

CHAPTER XIX THE MEXICAN WAR 438 

84 Texas and Oregon Questions 438 

85 Indiana Militia in 1846 439 



TABLE OF CONTENTS ix 

86 Organizing the Indiana Brigade 441 

87 Campaigning in Mexico 445 

CHAPTER XX THE CONSTITUTIONAL CON- 
VENTION OF 1850 450 

88 Early Agitation for Revision 450 

89 Organizing the Convention 454 

90 Politics of the Convention 456 

91 The New Constitution 459 

CHAPTER XXI POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852__ 462 

92 A Bankrupt State 462 

93 Campaign of 1844 466 

94 Political Demoralization 475 

95 Free Soilers in Indiana, 1846 to 1850 477 

96 The Last Struggle of the Whig Party, 

1852 484 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 491 

INDEX 503 



MAPS 

1 Indiana Territory, 1800 Frontispiece 

2 The French Explorers 13 

3 Indiana Counties, 1814 33 

4 Expedition of Clark 57 

5 Proposed Divisions of the Northwest Terri- 

tory 75 

6 The Northwest Territory, 1795 99 

7 Indiana Territory, 1812 211 

8 The Indians 241 

9 Rivers and Streams of Indiana 267 

10 Indiana in 1822 301 

11 Indian Cessions 329 

12 Land Surveys 345 

13 Internal Improvements 355 

14 Indiana in 1833 401 

15 Indiana in 1852 467 



A HISTORY OF INDIANA 



CHAPTER I 

the french in indiana, 1634-1763 

§ 1 The Jesuits Plan a Nation of Christian Indians 

The first account of the extensive plains and prairies 
south of the Great Lakes was given to the world by the 
Jesuit missionaries to the Huron Indians. The history of 
Indiana may well begin by recounting the plans of these 
early Jesuits for forming a Christian Indian nation around 
the Great Lakes. 

Inhabiting the Canadian peninsula extending down be- 
tween Lakes Huron and Erie and Ontario was an Indian 
population of from ten to twelve thousand souls. Along 
the southern shores of the lakes from Erie to the Mississippi 
river were situated numerous tribes more or less related to 
those in Canada ; so that within easy reach of Lake Huron, 
Lake Michigan, and Lake Superior there were not fewer 
than twenty-five thousand Indians. The Jesuits were the 
most advanced thinkers of that day. What visions they had 
of ideal government among this unspoiled Indian folk can- 
not be known. At one time they spoke of commerce and 
the expansion of France. At another, they expressed their 
view that if France was to become the ruler of this vast 
country and its simple folk, the seeds of French culture 
and patriotism should be implanted in the savage breast. 
In other letters they indulged the true Jesuit spirit that the 
church must outweigh the state in the hearts of the new 
people. At still other times they lamented the internal wars 
of the tribesmen and breathed a hope to see all of it disap- 



2 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

pear in an all-consuming love of God and the king. In vis- 
ion they saw the red men thoroughly Gallicized, imbued 
with French culture and patriotism, armed and officered 
by the French government, carrying the lilies of France in 
triumph over a continent won for civilization, the church, 
and the king. They may have indulged the more pacific 
dreams of Plato or More, or the unborn longings of Rous- 
seau. Whatever their thoughts and hopes, they perished 
W'ith their authors in the Canadian wilderness. 

The little band of Jesuits who accompanied the first 
French explorers to the regions of the upper St. Lawrence 
soon saw the advantages of the situation. During the win- 
ter of 1634, while the Jesuit Fathers were gathered in the 
residence of their superior, Father Le Jeune, at Quebec, 
the plans for this work were laid. Including Le Jeune, 
there were six of the Jesuit Fathers on the Huron mission. 
They were not at all discouraged by the difficulty of their 
undertaking, although they intended the conversion of a 
savage nation. ^ Le Jeune wrote to his superior in France 
"the harvest is plentiful and the laborers few." They were 
not without the benefit of experience, for the father su- 
perior himself had been in Quebec several years acquainting 
himself with the Indians, teaching and converting their 
children. He had even spent a winter with the Indians 
in the forest, accompanying them on their hunting trips. 
He knew very well what life among them meant. The 
terror of the work, however, only made it the more inviting. 
The Jesuits began at once to learn the Huron language and 
to collect necessary materials for the work among the In- 
dians. 

The distance from Quebec to the home of the Hurons 
was almost a thousand miles. After a tiresome journey of 
a month, poling their canoes up the Ottawa river, the fore- 
most priests reached the Huron villages on Thunder Bay. 
After they had spent five years in missionary work among 
the tribes, making regular rounds from town to town, they 
looked over the field as best they could and decided to make 

1 Francis Parknian, The Jesuits in 'North Anuricn, 42 seq. See also 
Jesuit Relations, index, '"Huron ilission." 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 3 

their mission home at St. Marie on the south side of Matche- 
dash Bay. A systematic organization of the tribes was 
perfected, and the calendar of the saints was drawn on for 
new names for the Indian villages. There were St. Ignace, 
St. John the Baptist, St. Joseph, St. Michael, St. Marie, St. 
Louis and St. Paul. When in 1649 everything seemed 
promising of success, the Iroquois, the ancient enemies of 
the Hurons, attacked them with customary fury. The Hu- 
ron nation was destroyed and with it went the dream of a 
Jesuit empire around the Great Lakes. 

Jesuit priests continued to visit the western tribes for 
half a century, but few of them ever set foot on what is 
now the soil of Indiana. Within the next half century the 
Jesuit Fathers, Allouez, Dablon, and Marquette, estab- 
lished important missions around the Great Lakes. Some 
of these priests may have crossed from the Kankakee to the 
St. Joseph river, in Indiana, on their way to the West, but 
no mission is known to have been established in Indiana at 
this early date. 

§ 2 The Fur Traders 

In the next period, 1650 to 1750, missionaries and fur- 
traders mingled together. It is always difficult to tell 
whether a post was established primarily as a mission or 
as a fur-trading station. The latter was not so much a 
place where furs were collected as a center from which 
agents visited the neighboring tribes to show the kettles, 
blankets, knives, and other articles of trade furnished by 
the French, and to encourage the Indians to carry their 
furs to the large posts on the lower St. Lawrence. 

The annual trip of the Indians to Three Rivers, Quebec, 
or Montreal was full of danger. Usually two or three hun- 
dred warriors went together. They made the journey in 
June and July, going by way of Lake Nipissing and the 
Ottav/a river to avoid the Iroquois tribes. Arriving near 
Quebec or Montreal, they landed, put up their tents, greased 
and painted their bodies, and assorted their goods prepara- 
tory to trading. Their goods consisted almost entirely of 
furs and tobacco. The second day was usually devoted to 



4 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

a formal council between the French officers and the chiefs. 
After the council, two more days were consumed in bar- 
tering. Some of the tribesmen were expert gamblers and 
tried their luck against the French; others, especially the 
Hurons, were said to have been skillful thieves. After the 
trading was all done, the French invited their visitors to 
a grand feast. Then followed a night of revelry, after 
which the Indians set out at dawn for their homes. In this 
way, no doubt, many of Indiana's native inhabitants visited 
the French on the lower St. Lawrence. 

During the fall and winter seasons the trader spent his 
time, in part, among the Indians preparing for the harvest 
of furs in the spring. He was the leading man of the post 
or colony holding his commission directly froiyi his king. 
He had money and influence at court. Around him was a 
nondescript body of hunters, soldiers, and adventurers, 
over whom he held nominal military power. With each 
band of fur gatherers there went a Jesuit, whose gentle 
influence it was that welded the strong friendships be- 
tween the French and Indians. It will be enough for our 
purpose if we describe the labors of one of these traders. 

La Salle was a member of the well-known family of 
Caveliers of Rouen, France, the son of a wealthy burgher 
merchant. He was educated by the Jesuits, who then con- 
trolled the best schools in the world. A brother of his 
was a Sulpician priest in Canada. With what little pocket- 
money he could get. La Salle sailed for Canada, reaching 
Quebec in 1666, whence he went on immediately to Mon- 
treal, then little more than a mission of the Sulpicians. 
He acquired a large tract of land at what is now Lachine, 
at the head of the rapids, nine miles above Montreal. 
This place was well situated for the fur trade. 

La Salle learned from the Seneca Indians that far to 
the west was a beautiful river flowing through the forest 
to join another great river which flowed far to the south 
and emptied into the Vermilion Sea. It did not take him 
long to make up his mind that here was a chance to serve 
his nation and also himself. This, he thought, was the river 
that would lead him to the South Sea and thus open a route 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 5 

to India. The governor and the priests of Canada were 
easily won over to the enterprise, especially since La Salle 
undertook to pay all expenses himself. For this purpose 
he sold his grant at Lachine. 

By July 6, 1669, La Salle with twenty-four men in seven 
canoes was ready to start from Lachine. His men paddled 
the canoes up the St. Lawrence and into Lake Ontario. In 
thirty-five days from the time they left their camp they had 
reached a small bay on the south side of Lake Ontario 
near the mouth of the Seneca river. Here they left their 
boats, and went with some Seneca Indians to their village 
homes. The Senecas did not take kindly to La Salle's plan 
of going to the Ohio, and refused to show him the way. The 
latter went back to his canoes and continued westward on 
the lake to Niagara river. At an Indian village in this 
neighborhood he met a party of warriors returning with a 
Pottawattomie prisoner. This prisoner La Salle ransomed 
on his agreeing that he lead the Frenchman to the Ohio. 
Tradition has it that the party then came on southward 
from Lake Erie until they reached a branch of the Ohio. 
This stream they descended to its mouth; thence down the 
Ohio as far as the Falls at Louisville. Here La Salle's men 
deserted him and turned back to the east, leaving their 
captain alone to find his way back to Canada as best he 
could. 

Having returned to the Great Lakes, La Salle is said by 
Margry to have sailed westward across Lake Erie, through 
the Detroit river, and Lake Huron, around to the southern 
point of Lake Michigan, to have crossed over to the Illinois 
river, followed it down to the Mississippi, and to have 
floated far enough down the Missisippi to assure himself 
that it emptied into the Gulf of Mexico. That he discovered 
the Ohio, there is little doubt ; but of his early discovery of 
the Missisippi we cannot be sure.^ During the following 
six or seven years he does not seem to have been active. 
However, he never forgot the rivers he had seen or heard of 

2 Winsor. Narrative and Critical History of America, IV, 201 ; Park- 
man, LaSallc and the Discovery of the Great West (index) ; Oscar J. 
Craig, Indiana Historical Society Pnhlication^, II, p. 7. 
(2) 



6 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

and the opportunities they held for fur trade and coloniza- 
tion. Compared with the frozen wastes of Canada, the 
prairies and river bottoms of Ilinois and Indiana seemed 
fairyland. The road from Quebec, though, was too long and 
dangerous, so he planned to reach the new field by way of 
the Mississippi. By the year 1678 everything being in 
readiness he started west to open up the fur trade of upper 
Canada. While spending the following vdnter at Fronte- 
nac on Lake Ontario, he built a small ship called the Griffin. 
With this he sailed through Lake Erie and up the Detroit 
river, across Lake St. Clair into Lake Huron, through the 
Straits of Mackinac into Lake Michigan, landing in Sep- 
tember at Green Bay. The ship started back to Niagara. 
The explorers came on down to the southern shore of Lake 
Michigan and paddled around to the mouth of the St. Joseph 
river, which they called Miamis, reaching this place by 
November 1. Here, near the mouth of the river, they built 
a fort — the little Fort Miamis — while they were waiting for 
Lieutenant Henri de Tonty and his companions, who were 
coming overland. 

December 3 the party, numbering twenty-eight, started 
in eight canoes for the Illinois country, going by way of the 
Kankakee portage. They ascended the St. Joseph of the 
Lakes until they reached the south bend, near where the 
city of South Bend now stands. They watched carefully for 
the portage path which they had been told was in that 
neighborhood and by which they hoped to reach the Illinois. 
Unfortunately while the Mohegan hunter was absent they 
passed this path without noticing it. While La Salle was 
on shore searching for it he became separated from his 
friends. Night came on bringing with it a snowstorm. 
Wrapped in their blankets the weary explorers lay down to 
sleep. Meanwhile their leader, hopelessly lost, found a 
grass bed, prepared by an Indian, and in that he passed 
the night. So fared these early white visitors to Indiana, 
the first of whom we have any clear and reliable account. 
At four o'clock the next day La Salle regained the river and 
soon found his men. The Indian guide who had meantime 
been hunting for the trail (which he finally found) had 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 7 

returned also and together they started on the portage path 
for the Kankakee, five miles distant. It did not take them 
long to reach the Kankakee, a narrow ribbon of water, flow- 
ing drowsily through the tufts of swamp grass, obstructed 
here and there with clusters of alder bushes and pools of 
still water. In this stream they launched their canoes and 
floated slowly westward toward the Illinois country. Game 
was scarce and provisions ran low. Finally, when almost 
exhausted they found a buffalo bull mired in the swamp. 
They killed him, dragged him out, and feasted. They then 
floated on down the river into the Illinois, and down that 
river until they came to a high cliff overlooking the left 
bank of the stream. Nearby was a large Indian town, but 
no Indians. 

Here La Salle determined to build a fort and gather 
around him the Indian tribes of the region which now em- 
braces the greater part of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Ken- 
tucky. To this place he determined to transport his goods 
and establish a central trading station for all this western 
country. He could send his furs down the Mississippi river 
to the Gulf, and thence to France, while his goods to be 
used in traffic with the Indians could be brought back up 
the Mississippi in the returning boats. The site chosen 
was the favorite dwelling place of the Illinois Indians. In 
the vicinity were encamped the Peoria Indians, Miamis, 
Piankeshaws, Mascoutins, Weas and others from far and 
near. There were even refugee Abenakis from the forests 
of Maine, and Hurons from the lands beyond the Great 
Lakes. Most of these had been driven here by fear of the 
Iroquois. It is doubtful if a single Indian tribe at this 
time made its home in what is now Indiana through dread 
of those wide-ranging marauders, who had secured fire- 
arms from the Dutch at New York. La Salle went to work 
immediately to carry out his plans. He named his fort 
St. Louis in remembrance of his king, Louis XIV. He 
gathered furs during the winter, and sent them by different 
members of the party to Montreal. The faithless agents 
sold the furs, but never reported to their master. As 
La Salle was hastening back to Canada to ascertain the 



8 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

trouble, on the way he met a new commander, sent out by 
the governor of Canada to take possession of Fort St. 
Louis. 

La Salle concealed his anger, went on to Canada, ar- 
ranged matters there, but when he returned he found his 
fort and village completely ruined. In the autumn of 1680 
a war party of Iroquois, well armed, and led by a chief in 
a Jesuit robe, had conquered the Illinois town. The Indians 
themselves were saved through the tact and bravery of 
Tonty, the lieutenant of La Salle, but the town was utterly 
destroyed; so that when La Salle returned there were only 
enough traces remaining to show what had been the fury 
of its Iroquois destroyers. Thus was dispelled the dream 
of making a nation of fur-gatherers out of the western 
Indians. 

The efforts of La Salle, however, did not end with this 
defeat. During the year 1682-3 he was again busy among 
the Indians of Indiana and Illinois trying to persuade them 
to settle once more around his fort. He even invited Indians 
from across the Mississippi to join him. Indiana was al- 
most deserted of her native population. But the failure 
of the plan was assured even before La Salle's death. Had 
it prospered, what later became the Northwest Territory 
would have become an immense fur-trading field with the 
Indians as the fur gatherers. After the downfall of La 
Salle, there was a general migration of the tribes, due to 
a weakening of French influence. 

§ 3 Louis XIV and the Mississippi Valley 

At the opening of the eighteenth century, it seemed 
that France had a firm grip on the north central part of 
what is now the United States. She held its two natural 
highways, the Mississippi and St. Lawrence rivers; but 
there was a fatal weakness both in the north and south. 
The French were hindered in the navigation of the Missis- 
sippi by the hostile Chickasaws, who lived on the Vicksburg 
bluffs. On the other hand they were not able to pass the 
Niagara river, or the upper St. Lawrence, on account of the 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 9 

hostile Iroquois. Had it not been for these two tribes of 
Indians the history of the Northwest might have been 
different. Nevertheless the French king, Louis XIV, began 
at this time to take great interest in the Mississippi Valley. 
The country was divided between the governments at New 
Orleans and Quebec, the dividing line running east and 
west through central Indiana, near Terre Haute. A French 
explorer named D'Iberville, under instructions from Louis 
XIV, tried to carry out the scheme of La Salle by concen- 
trating the northwestern tribes on the Ohio, but this failed. 

Along with this plan of D'Iberville it was decided to 
construct a sufficient number of forts within the north- 
western country to protect it from the English traders who 
were rapidly becoming interested in the western fur-trade. 
D'Iberville himself established a post in 1699 at Biloxi, 
Mississippi. La Motte Cadillac fortified the post at Detroit 
in 1701. Forts Chartres and Kaskaskia were established 
over on the Mississippi in southern Illinois. Since the In- 
dians were moving toward the east, it was planned to fortify 
the route from Lake Erie to the Mississippi by way of the 
Wabash. It was in carrying out this policy that most of 
the permanent posts of the Northwest were founded. These 
guarded the important river thoroughfares and the great 
portages. Around, and in them the missionaries and traders 
made their headquarters and for this reason the Indians 
also frequently gathered near. The policy of the king in 
selling the exclusive right of the fur-trade to a single man 
or company had not only ruined the fur-trading business 
but had demoralized the traders. 

In the early eighteenth century the only white people 
in what is now Indiana were the roving fur-traders, called 
coureurs de hois, and the Jesuit missionaries. The French 
fur-traders had become divided into two classes. Those who 
had no license were called coureurs de hois or woods rangers, 
partly because they had no fixed homes. They were either 
petty criminals from France, or Canadians, driven from 
home by the severe trading laws of the time. They lived 
with the Indians in true Indian fashion. Their life was 
hard. In storm and shine they plied their paddles along 



10 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the lakes or on the small streams, overhung by boughs and 
grapevines and obstructed by drift, rocks, or sunken logs. 
While they, at times, feasted on venison and turkey, their 
usual fare was parched corn and bear grease. Once in a 
long while they visited the French towns of lower Canada 
spending a few weeks there in drunken revelry; but they 
were always in danger of being taken as outlaws. Reck- 
less, careless, lawless, openhearted, trusty, and jovial, they 
had the characteristics of the modern cowboys of the plains. 
The licensed traders formed a more orderly class. At 
Quebec and Montreal they had headquarters, from which 
they carried their goods to the western posts in canoes. 
The Indian pony, a horse from Normandy, was soon brought 
in for a pack horse; still later Canadian carts were used 
at such portages as Niagara and Ft. Wayne, but never for 
long journeys. Very little record was left of this period of 
our history. Rarely could more than one man of a party or 
at a post write, and all his time was taken in listing furs 
and keeping accounts. 

§ 4 Miami Indians 

Reference has been made heretofore to the Indians 
inhabitating the soil of what is now Indiana. It is of 
course impossible to gather enough data to write a satis- 
factory account of the Miamis or any other of the western 
tribes in the seventeenth century. A short account, how- 
ever, will give some idea of the location, numbers and char- 
acteristics of these forest folk. 

In 1658, Gabriel Dreuillettes, then stationed at the 
mission of St. Michael on the west shore of Lake Michigan, 
reported that the Miamis, evidently the whole nation, for 
they numbered according to his estimate eight thousand 
men or twenty-four thousand souls, were in the southwest 
corner of what is now the State of Michigan. This is in 
harmony with other reports which go to show that the val- 
ley of the St. Joseph of the Lakes was one of their favorite 
homes. 

The Iroquois of New York seem to have invaded the 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 11 

western country, what is now Indiana and Illinois, about 
1670 and caused a panic among the native tribes. They 
had succeeded in getting firearms from the Dutch at New 
York about 1630. During the next forty years they waged 
incessant and victorious war on all their neighbors, almost 
exterminating the New England tribes on the east, the Dela- 
wares on the south, the Eries on the west, and the Hurons 
on the north and northwest. With these tribes subdued 
they led their war parties farther to the west and attacked 
the Miamis and the Illinois on the prairies. For this reason, 
presumably, tlie Miamis next appear in history west of 
Lake Michigan. 

In 1670 Claude Allouez, then stationed at Green Bay, 
reported a Miami village a day's journey in the interior 
from that mission. At the same time another band was 
living near the Illinois towns down on the Illinois river. 

The same year, Allouez made a trip to central Wisconsin 
where, mingling with the Foxes and the Mascoutins, he 
found what he took to be the whole Miami nation. The mis- 
sionary, Allouez, adds significantly that they were all in 
terror because a war party of Iroquois had swooped into 
the neighborhood recently and destroyed a Fox village. 

Allouez was impressed with the general character of the 
Miamis. He called them gentle, affable, and sedate. Their 
language was in harmony with their dignity. They spoke 
slowly, manifesting great interest in what the Jesuit, Al- 
louez, had to say. Two years later, 1672, when Allouez re- 
turned to this station there yet remained ninety cabins of 
Miamis. The Jesuit relation of the same year also stated 
that the village near Green Bay still remained. 

By 1674 Allouez had gathered a goodly colony of them 
at the mission of St. Francis Xavier on Green Bay. The 
missionaries invariably spoke well of the Miamis, praising 
especially their ability as hunters, and their faithfulness. 

Jean de Lamberville, writing September 20, 1682, to 
Count Frontenac stated that the Iroquois had at that time 
a large number of Miami captives whom they would soon 
torture unless French intervention saved them. De Lam- 
berville also feared that an Iroquois army, twelve hundred 



12 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

strong, then forming, as the missionaries supposed, at the 
instigation of the English for an invasion of the Illinois 
country, would completely annihilate the Miamis and their 
neighbors the Siskakon and Ottawa tribes on the head- 
waters of the Maumee, on their return journey. 

In 1680, as has been noted in the account of La Salle's 
exploration, the Iroquois attacked the Illinois with disas- 
trous results to the latter. There were many traditions of 
this Iroquois war handed down to the missionaries and 
traders among the western Indians. What battles were 
fought, what tragedies were enacted, what heroism dis- 
played, or what the final result was, can never now be 
known. One of these traditions, dear to the Miamis, was 
to the effect that a Miami chief having seen an army of 
Iroquois pass on its way to attack the Illinois at once dis- 
patched runners to all his villages and to the villages of all 
his kinsmen, summoning all to meet him, prepared for des- 
perate battle. With his tribesmen he formed an ambuscade 
on the banks of the Wabash and, as the Iroquois warriors 
returned, delirious with blood and plunder, fell upon them 
with such fury that only a few escaped. This battle was 
said to have been fought where Terre Haute now stands. 
The place was known among the Indians as the "Old Battle 
Ground." 

Whether there is any truth in the tradition, or whether 
Miami ingenuity contrived it to hide the shame of their 
submission to the Iroquois, the fact is beyond question that 
the Miamis were back on their old hunting grounds in 
northeastern Indiana and western Ohio about the year 
1700. By this time they had secured firearms from the 
French and English and it is possible that in this tradition- 
ary battle in which they handled the Iroquois so roughly 
they fought with firearms on equal terms. "^ 

Gen. William H. Harrison, who was well acquainted 
with the western Indians, said the Miamis occupied all of 
Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin south of the Fox and Wis- 
consin rivers, and Ohio east of the Scioto. He thought them 

sje.<tuit RrJittions, index "Minmis"; Lewis H. Morgan, Leapuc of the 
Iroquois, 14; Winsor. Narnitivc and Critical History of America, index. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 



13 




Korta erected by the French before 

the opening of the French and Indian War 



The French Exploreks. By E. V. Shockley. 



14 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the most powerful confederacy of Indians in America.^ 
He did not think they had ever submitted to the Iroquois. 

§ 5 The First Settlement in Indiana 

Around this difficult question a local literature has 
grown up. The difficulty seems destined to remain without 
final solution. As Joliet floated down the Missisippi in the 
summer of 1673 he noted the mouth of the Ohio river, giving 
to the stream the Indian name "Oualoouskigou," evidently 
the same name which we write Wabash. This was, no 
doubt, the first sight of the mouth of the Ohio had by a 
civilized man. That it was then called the Wabash is 
significant."^ Marquette, Avho, as a missionary, accompanied 
Joliet on this voyage of discovery was attracted by the Illi- 
nois Indians and in the autumn of 1674 returned to found a 
mission among them in the vicinity of the site of Chicago. 
He was detained by illness and did not reach the Indian 
village of Kaskaskia until the following spring. His health 
was fast failing and he started to return to St. Ignace at 
the outlet of Lake Michigan but died somewhere on the east 
shore of the lake. Effort has been made to prove that Mar- 
quette crossed by the Kankakee-St. Joseph portage on his 
return journey toward St. Ignace but there is no evidence 
on the point and it must remain for the present pure con- 
jecture.^ 

There is good reason to believe, however, that the St. 
Joseph-Kankakee portage had been used before La Salle's 
voyage. It would have been a strange proceeding for La 
Salle to lay all his plans to cross by this route had he not 
known of its possibilities. The inference is that Claude 
Allouez, founder of the missions at St. Marie and Green 
Bay, had used this portage in his visits to the Illinois, Potto- 
wattomie, and Miami Indians.'^ 

4 William Henry Harrison. Aborigines of the Ohio Vallcii, 23. 

5 Justin Winsor, Narrative and Critical History of America, IV, 178. 

6 Winsor, Narrative and Critical History of America, IV. 220: George 
A. Baker, The St. Joseph-Kankalcee Portage. 2.3 ; John Gilmary Shea. Dis- 
covery and Exploration of the Mississippi, 57. 

"> Winsor, The Mississippi Basin, 2G. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 15 

In the fall of 1700, Gravier, then on a hunting trip with 
the Kaskaskia Indians, stopped at the mouth of the Ohio 
river. The main stream he called the Wabash. It was 
formed, he observed, of three rivers, the Wabash proper, 
which came from the country of the Miamis; the Ohio, 
which came from the lands of the Iroquois ; and the branch 
from the southeast, which flowed from the land of the 
Shawnees who traded with the English. These remarks 
show that the Jesuits had an accurate general idea of the 
Ohio Valley.s 

The next notice of the Ohio river has nothing to do 
directly with the history of Indiana though it has given 
rise, through a misunderstanding, to a great deal of contro- 
versy. Charles Juchereau de St. Denis, in the autumn of 
1702, established a trading post and tannery on the lower 
Ohio, perhaps where Fort Massac was later built. The 
purpose was to overawe the English traders on the Ohio. 
Father Mermet accompanied Juchereau from Kaskaskia. 
The site of Juchereau's post was unhealthful and it was 
found impossible to keep the Indians there. The com- 
mandant himself died two years later at which time the 
post was abandoned. It was only a temporary post and 
all trace of it was soon gone. The earlier historians of the 
West were confused by the Jesuit relations calling this 
"la poste sur la Vabache." It was thought to refer to the 
founding of "Au Poste" or Vincennes." The French were 
driven away by the hostile Miamis.^" 

By this time a peace had been patched up between the 
Seneca Indians, an Iroquois tribe, and their western neigh- 
bors. The Miamis were again settled in Indiana and north- 
western Ohio. The Shawnees had returned to Ohio from 
their fastnesses in the mountains of Kentucky and Tennes- 
see and fur traders were visiting regularly the tribes on the 
Indiana streams. A keen rivalry soon sprang up between 
the English and Dutch on the one hand and the French on 
the other. 

8 Winsor, Mississippi Basin, 61. 

9 The Jesuit Relations, LXV, 268 ; LXVI, 39. 

10 Winsor, The Mississippi Basin, 70. 



16 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

During the closing years of the seventeenth century 
the Miamis, Ouiatanons, and other smaller tribes began 
settling, or resettling, in what is now Indiana. The reasons 
for this are not plain. Besides the tradition concerning a 
defeat of the Iroquois, it may be suggested that the founding 
of Detroit in 1701, the presence of at least 1,000 and perhaps 
2,000 armed Frenchmen in and around Detroit, ^^ the effort 
of the English to prevent the westward forays of the Iro- 
quois which were preventing English traders from enjoying 
the patronage of the northwestern Indians, and an inter- 
tribal war all influenced the Miamis and their kinsmen 
to return to the eastv/ard. 

At first these tribes gathered in pretty close around De- 
troit. But as fear of the English and Iroquois diminished 
they moved farther and farther south. First on the St. 
Joseph of the Lakes in 1702; in 1712 they were down on 
the upper Maumee trading secretly with the English; and 
later they had ventured far down on the Wabash and the 
Scioto. The French soon realized their mistake in bringing 
the Miamis so far east, where they were falling under the 
control of the English. The policy of France in the west 
during the next forty years was dominated by the purpose 
of preventing the English from enjoying the trade with 
these Indiana and Ohio tribes. The expedition of Celoron 
Bienville down the Ohio, and the building of Fort Du- 
quesne on the site of Pittsburg were parts of the same 
general program. Sieur de Vincennes had been sent by 
Frontenac, governor general of Canada, as early as 1697 
to command a post among the Miamis. The exact location 
of this post does not appear but most probably it was the 
one established by La Salle near the mouth of the St. Joseph 
in southwestern Michigan, 

In 1704 Vaudreuil, who succeeded Frontenac in 1698, 
sent Vincennes again on a mission to the Miamis to prevent 
them, if possible, from attacking the Iroquois. The gov- 
ernor added that Captain Vincennes was "much beloved" 
by these Indians. He took with him some goods, six men, 
and two canoes. Several times, on later occasions, Vau- 

11 Documents Rrlaling to the Colonial Histori/ of Xeio York. IV, 701. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 17 

dreuil sent Vincennes on missions to the Miamis. Finally 
in his communication of October 28, 1719, he stated that the 
Sieur de Vincennes had died at his post among the Miamis, 
where the city of Fort Wayne, Indiana, now stands. 

It seems that the Indians were on the point of mi- 
grating with Vincennes to the northern St. Joseph river 
but upon his death they refused to leave what they called 
their ancestral town of Kekionga. 

In 1672 the Wea Indians were in central Wisconsin, 
gathered with their kinsmen around the mission of St. 
Jaques on the Fox river, under the care of Claude Allouez. 
They were at this time a small band.^- By 1710 they had 
returned to northern Indiana and were under the control 
of missionaries from Detroit, i"* In an official report on the 
Indians of the Lake-Erie country, dated 1718, the agent 
said five villages of Ouiatanons or Weas dwelt on the Wa- 
bash. In language, customs, and dress they resembled the 
Miamis. They had a "fort" situated on a high hill from 
which one could see countless buifalos grazing on the 
prairie. These Indians had earned an enviable reputation 
among the traders for their cleanliness. They allowed no 
dirt or filth to remain on the floor of their "fort" which 
they kept sanded like the "Tuilleries." They had, at that 
time, over two leagues of cleared land where they raised 
corn, pumpkins and melons. The men numbered one 
thousand or twelve hundred, wore very little clothing, and 
played and danced incessantly.^'* 

To keep the Iroquois out the French constructed a 
stockade at Ouiatanon on the north bank of the Wabash in 
1720. This was on the main western trail from Post Miami 
at the site of Fort Wayne. 

Governor Vaudreuil was very apprehensive lest all the 
Miamis go to New York to trade, as eight or ten canoes 
had done the previous summer. In order to forestall this 
movement, the governor had decided to send Sieur Dubuis- 
son to take charge of the post at Ouiatanon. This was in 

12 Jesuit Relations, LVIII, 23. 293. 

^3 Jesuit Relations, LXIX. 193. 

14 Documents Relating to the Colonial History of Neiv York, IX, 891, 



18 , HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the autumn of 1719. He wrote as if the post had already 
been established. ^^ 

The purpose of Dubuisson was to get the confidence of 
the Indians as soon as possible and lead them to the St. 
Joseph river, away from the Maumee-Wabash route, which 
seems to have been much frequented at that early day by 
English traders. On the St, Joseph of the Lakes the Indians 
would be under the control of the garrison and traders of 
Detroit. 1*^ 

Dubuisson remained in command but a short time until 
he was relieved by Francois Morgane de Vincennes, thought 
to be the founder of Post Vincennes. He seems to have 
been a nephew of the Sieur de Vincennes who died at the 
post where Fort Wayne now stands. It is probable that 
Vincennes remained in command at Ouiatanon until he was 
called down the river to take charge of the post that has 
since borne his name. Ouiatanon remained an occupied 
post till its destruction by the Indians in Pontiac's War.^''' 

In his report to the Lords of Trade May 24, 1765, Sir 
William Johnson, the British agent for the northern In- 
dians, stated that several French families of the worst sort 
lived at the Miami (Fort Wayne) and several at Ouiatanon, 
and, in short, at all the places where they formerly had had 
posts or trading houses.^^ The same person writing in 
1767, after Pontiac's war, complained that Ouiatanon had 
not been re-established as he had recommended. Its con- 
venient location in the neighborhood of several tribes, he 
observed, would make it a most convenient post for the 
traders. 19 

The best that can be done now in the matter of the first 
permanent settlement of Indiana is to give briefly the tes- 
timony of the Jesuit relations and other fugitive references 

15 Winsor, The MississipjH Basin, 2SG. 

^^ Documents Relating to the Colonial History of New York, IX, 894. 

1" For references to the history of Ouiatanon see Early Western 
Travels, index. The best single discussion of these early posts on the 
Wabash is by J. P. Dunn. Indiana, 41 seq. 

^^ Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New 
York, VII, 716. 

19 /&i^, 973. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 19 

of the French officers and traders. A more careful search- 
ing of the French records may yet bring to light satisfactory 
evidence as to the time and manner of its establishment. 
Such discovery is problematical and, if made, will be in the 
nature of an accident. 

Nicholas Ignace de Beaubois took charge of the parish 
of Kaskaskia, July, 1720. September 15, following, the 
Company of the Indies filed a petition with the government 
asking that a post be established on the Wabash. It seems, 
however, that no action was taken ; for Charlevoix, writing 
November 8, 1721, after visiting the Illinois country, points 
out the great advantage a post on the Wabash would have. 
La Harpe, in 1724, and Boisbriant, the commandant at 
Chartres, wrote in 1725 as if no post had yet been estab- 
lished. 

In the accounts of the colony of Louisiana for 1726 is 
the following item : At the Wabash, when it is established, 
one priest, 600 livres; for a servant 185 livres. De Beau- 
bois, then at Chartres, was especially urgent that a post 
be established in the direction of the Ohio, since all re- 
ports indicated that English traders were making deep 
inroads on the Indian trade in that quarter. 

A list of the missionaries supported by the Company of 
the Indies, written by some clerk of the Company, or per- 
haps a monk, and dated November 21, 1728, included Pere 
d'Outrelay at the "Ouabache." A long struggle had been 
going on between the Capuchins and the Jesuits for the 
control of the missionary posts in Louisiana. Pere de 
Beaubois, who was no doubt the promoter of the mission 
at Vincennes, had in 1728 just been displaced by Pere 
Petit. Most of Beaubois' papers are, unfortunately, lost. 

A letter from the Company of the Indies to the governor 
of Louisiana, M. Perier, September 30, 1726, directed the 
latter to furnish eight or ten soldiers to Sieur de Vincennes 
in order to found a post on the lower Wabash. Sieur de 
Vincennes was then at Ouiatanon, the post among the Weas. 

Etienne d'Outrelay, a Jesuit who spent twenty years in 



20 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the Mississippi Valley, returning to France in 1747, is men- 
tioned as having been at the fort on the Wabash in 1728.-*^ 

A memorandum by M. de St. Denis, commandant at 
Nachitoches, dated November 30, 1731, stated that the War 
bash post had always been neglected, that it guarded the 
only avenue by which the English could attack Louisiana, 
and that he would favor a station there with 400 men rather 
than one with 300, as seems to have been intended. The 
commandant, he added, should receive 800 livres. This 
latter allowance Maurepas, the royal minister, had also 
fixed upon. 

Finally the letters of M. de Vincennes to the governor, 
dated March 7, 1733, and March 21, 1733, leave no doubt 
that a permanent post had been established before that 
date, at a point eighty leagues up the Wabash from its 
mouth. The date of the founding of the post, he left in 
obscurity. The position, he wrote, was well suited to the 
establishment of a large post, and he would have established 
one had he had the necessary troops. There had never been 
so great a need of troops during the three years of his stay 
at the post as there was at that time. The Illinois and the 
Miami were growing insolent, due no doubt to the contact 
with the English. The fortifications had been begun three 
years previous but nothing much had been done toward 
their completion. There was a stockade with two houses 
enclosed. The immediate construction of a guard house and 
barracks for the soldiers was recommended. Without more 
troops it would be impossible for him to remain there 
longer. The post, in his opinion, needed thirty men and an 
officer. The garrison consisted of ten men, and the "fort" 
was not large enough to accommodate even that number. 
There were evidently some French settlers around the post, 
since in the second letter the writer said the Chickasaws 
had, during the previous fall, killed six Frenchmen who 
lived at the Wabash. 

That the dominating motive in the establishment of the 
post was the protection of the fur trade is evident from the 
tone of the correspondence. "It is possible," observed Sieur 

20 Jesuit Relations, LXVII. 342. note. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 21 

de Vincennes, "to send out from this post every year about 
30,000 skins. That, Monsieur, is all the skins that can be 
secured for the present." The commandant was accustomed 
to borrow large sums of money from the voyageurs who 
frequented the place. There is evidence to show that quite 
a large number of these independent traders were then on 
the Wabash and its branches and doubtless they had other 
stockade posts in what is now Indiana.- ^ 

Louis Vivier was stationed there as a Jesuit missionary, 
1754-1756.-- Francais Philibert Watrin, writing from 
Paris, September 3, 1764, said the "post called Vincennes 
or Saint Ange, from the names of the officers who com- 
manded there," was about eighty leagues from Kaskaskia 
and about seventy leagues up the Wabash from its mouth. 
He says nothing about its founding or its founders, unless 
we should infer that since he named two commanders he 
would have named them had there been others. Winsor 
thought the post Vincennes was known among the fur 
traders as early as 1722.23 

These Indiana posts, excepting Vincennes, never came 
to be real settlements. For a while Ouiatanon remained the 
most important fur-trading and missionary post on the Wa- 
bash; but its importance diminished after eight or ten 
years. The old French post at Kekionga, or as it was 
usually called Fort Miami, if any fort was ever built, dis- 
appeared entirely, later, but Vincennes maintained its ex- 
istence unbroken. 

The dates of the first settlement of these places will, from 
the nature of the case, always remain uncertain. Each 
marks the location of an important Indian village. Fur 
traders made these places their temporary headquarters 
doubtless as early as 1700. Missionaries visited them as 
early or perhaps earlier. We do not even have the record 
of the first military stations established here. In 1736, a 

21 The evidence couceruing the foundiug of Vincennes is well summed 
up in Vol. III. PuhUcations of the Indiana Historical Society, 255, seq. 
See also J. P. Dunn. Indiana, ch. II ; Jesuit Relations, index. Copies of 
the letters of Vincennes are in the library of Vincennes University. 

22 Jesuit Relations, LXIX, 290, note. 

23 The Mississippi Basin, 118. 

(3) 



22 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

man by the name of Francois Morgane Sieur de Vincennes 
v^^as stationed at the Piankeshaw village, Chipkawke, with 
a considerable body of French troops. From the name of 
the officer comes the name of the city of Vincennes. This 
commandant was killed by the Chickasaws and his place 
taken by St. Ange. Whether Vincennes was the founder of 
the post, or even its first commandant, no one at this time 
can say with certainty. 

§ 6 The French Settlers 

After the failure of La Salle, the king of France granted 
control of all the commerce of Louisiana to one of his 
courtiers named Anthony Crozat. This grant included the 
Illinois country and the Wabash. Crozat had expected to 
find rich mines of gold and silver, but disappointed in this 
he surrendered his gift to the cro^vn in 1717. That same 
year a monopoly of the trade was granted to the Mississippi 
Company. This company in turn was superseded by the 
Western Company, also called the Company of the Indies. 
From 1720 to 1731 the latter company was in exclusive con- 
trol of the Illinois and Indiana country. Its policy was not 
to encourage settlements, and it retained complete feudal 
rights over all who did settle in its territory. The company 
built Ft. Chartres, near Kaskaskia, and there made its 
headquarters. 

When the Company of the Indies surrendered its charter 
April 10, 1732, the king of France resumed direct control. 
From this period dates the actual settlements in both In- 
diana and Illinois. Before this everything had looked 
toward the fur trade. Now there were settlements made 
by cultivators of the soil. It is in connection with the car- 
rying out of this policy that the first authentic mention is 
made of the settlement at Vincennes. As stated above, the 
Chickasaw Indians made traffic on the Mississippi ex- 
tremely dangerous. In the year 1736, D'Artiguiette was 
instructed to take what force he had in Illinois and join De 
Vincennes, who was to come down the Wabash from his 
station supposed to be where Vincennes now stands. The 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 23 

French, who numbered three or four hundred, were defeat- 
ed by the hostile Chickasaws. De Vincennes was among the 
slain. After this the records are silent as to Fort Vincennes 
for twelve years. From then, 1749, the records in the parish 
church are complete. 

The French settlers borrowed their habits of dress from 
the Indian. They wore little else than the hunting shirt, 
leggins, and moccasins, in colder weather a blanket or a 
buffalo robe being wrapped around the body. There were 
several styles of house building. The earliest house was 
built by setting in a square four forked posts and putting 
cross-poles from one to the other and making the walls and 
roof with bark or brush or anything else that was handy 
and would keep out wind and rain. A somewhat better 
house was built by the planters around Vincennes, which 
consisted of a double row of puncheons planted upright in 
the ground, the space between being filled with mortar, and 
whitewashed within and without. In still more pretentious 
houses, built in later years at the "Old Post," there were 
four or five rooms with an open porch on the side and an 
attic sleepingroom reached by a ladder. These rooms 
were warmed by a fireplace. Outside the house was a bake 
oven in the old French style.-^ Their woolly ponies were 
sheltered by a "pole stable" which could be removed when 
the accumulations of manure made it necessary. 

The priests in Canada made many complaints about the 
lawlessness of the coiireurs de hois or bush-lopers. The lat- 
ter were no better, perhaps no worse, than the ordinary In- 
dians with whom they lived and whose customs they 
adopted. After the transfer of the government of the Illi- 
nois and Wabash country from Canada to New Orleans a 
better class of French people came to the posts. Still there 
were never any French settlers at Ft. Wayne and Ouiatanon 
except fur traders. The latter, now no longer outlaws, 
could carry on a regular commerce with the larger towns. 

The Indians granted to the French at Vincennes a tract 
of land extending from Point Coupee below the present 
site of Merom to the mouth of White river and extending 

24 For a picture of a bake oven see Harper's Magazine, CXVI, 440. 



24 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

back on either side of the Wabash. This was held jointly 
and on this extensive domain the villagers laid off an 
ample commons of 5,000 acres which they enclosed vdth 
pickets. On this commons each villager had one or more 
strips for cultivation. These strips were separated only by 
balks or turn-rows. Each villager was compelled by the 
commandant or syndic to keep up his part of the fence. At 
times, it seems, this enclosure was used as a pasture — 
perhaps after harvest. Judge Jacob Burnet tells how diffi- 
cult it was for the Northwest Territorial Legislature in 
1799 to regulate this commons, and a new law by the In- 
diana Territorial Legislature a few years later indicates 
that the early law was not entirely satisfactory. This 
commons lay southeast of the village of Vincennes, be- 
ginning about where the present courthouse stands. 

The village assembly usually determined all matters per- 
taining to the commons, or the common field. After church 
on Sunday the assembly would meet in the churchyard and 
determine a day for planting, or a day for harvest. The 
syndic presided over these parish meetings unless the mat- 
ter under consideration pertained to the church, when the 
priest took charge. 

Some farmers held their land as tenants direct from the 
crown; others of the wealthier class held large seigniories 
under feudal conditions. Nearly all these settlers on the 
Wabash were either commoners or tenants of the crown.^^ 

The farming in the Vincennes neighborhood was primi- 
tive. A large plow with wooden mold-board and flexible 
beam was in use. It was mounted on two wheels, the 
large one to run in the furrow, and a small one on the 
land. It was drawn usually by oxen as was later the cus- 
tom among the English settlers. Ordinarily a cart was 
found on each farm. This cart was a two-wheeled affair 
without any tires. On Sunday it served for a carriage in 
which the planter and his family rode to the parish church 
at Vincennes. The farm crops consisted of wheat and corn 
and various other grains, besides which there was always 

25 Carter, Great Britam and the Illinois Country, 10 ; Jacob Burnet, 
tfotes on the Settlement of the Northwest Territory, 307. 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 25 

a liberal supply of tobacco, for all the members of the 
family smoked, or used snuff. A great deal of wine and 
spruce beer was made for home use. The inhabitants 
were a jovial, careless, pious, unpolitical class of people. 
They took the world easy and so the world took them. 

After a year of bountiful harvest they spent the winter 
in social festivities such as dancing, feasting, and card 
playing. Even billiards were popular at this early date 
on the Wabash. They knew and cared little for the outside 
world. They sold beef, pork, and corn at New Orleans for 
what few manufactured goods they received. Their mili- 
tary commandant looked after all this world's affairs, and 
the parish priest attended to the affairs of the next world 
for them. Since there were no hotels, everybody's house 
was open to the stranger. A keen social rivalry existed 
and almost everyone knew his place. The invasion of Clark 
in 1779 put an end to this old-fashioned society. Little 
trace of the old settlers remains. In the schools in and 
about Vincennes, one may notice here and there the raven 
hair and the black sparkling eyes that mark a descendant 
of these subjects of Louis le Grande. 

With the passing of power to the English in 1763 the 
better class of the French inhabitants crossed the Missis- 
sippi into Spanish territory. This migration continued till 
after 1800, by which time most of the original French 
settlers had left the Illinois country. Their descendants 
may still be found on the lower Mississippi.-*' 

The more energetic Frenchmen were engaged in the 
fur trade. From the incomplete list, licensed by Governor 
Harrison in 1801, an idea may be had of the number, loca- 
tion and wide range of the early traders. All these had 
been trading previously, but the law then required that 
they take out a license. At Fort Wayne Joseph Richard- 
ville was one of the earliest traders. His son became a 
chief of the Miami tribe there. Peter la Fontaine, Baubien, 
and James Lasselle all traded at Fort Wayne before the 
Revolution. Lasselle held command of the post for some 
time during the Revolution till La Balme drove him away 

26 Clarence E. Carter, The Illinois Country, 29. 



26 HISTORY OF INDIANA / 

in 1780. Mr. Todd was licensed to trade at Blue River, 
Washington county; Mr. Dagenet at Terre Haute; Mr. 
Simon at Muncietown ; Mr. Henry Mayraus at Terre Haute ; 
Le Claire on the Vermillion river; Francis Boneus on the 
Kankakee ; Thomas Lusby with the Kickapoos ; Francis La- 
fantazii at the Kickapoo town on Pine creek; Louis Bouri 
on the Elkhart; Hyacinth Lasselle.on the Mississinewa ; 
Benart Besayou on lower Eel creek; Conner Brothers on 
White river ; Baptist Bino on the Tippecanoe ; Baptist Tou- 
pin with the Kickapoos; Francis Milleni on Vermillion; 
Charles Johnson at Terre Haute; Peter Thorn along the 
Ohio; Michael Brouillet on Vermillion river; Louis Severs 
on the Little Wabash; Joseph Dumay on White river; and 
Jonnet Pillet on White river. Some of them married Indian 
women and their children became warriors. 

The materials of the fur trade on the part of the Indians 
consisted entirely of furs and hides. During the French 
period traps were used almost exclusively in catching the 
wild animals. The French government never allowed its 
traders, in the early days, to supply the Indians with guns. 
It was not till near the close of the eighteenth century that 
these western tribes had them. The supply then came 
largely from the English. 

In exchange the traders gave coarse cloths, blue or scar- 
let paints, knives, hatchets, traps, kettles, hoes, blankets and, 
in ever increasing amounts, whiskey. The French had to 
buy these goods from a single company and pay high prices. 
So, when the English came, they could pay for furs almost 
double what the French had been offering. For instance, 
the French sold rifle balls at the rate of $4.00 per hundred, 
the English at $2.00. This caused great dissatisfaction and 
worry to the Indians. They liked the Frenchmen and hated 
the haughty Englishman; but their beaver skins would 
bring double value from the Englishman. There soon came 
to be two parties among the Wabash Indians, the one favor- 
ing the French and the other the English. The parties 
came to open war in 1751, and the English traders and 
their Indian partisans were driven out. 

The French government in America depended almost 



THE FRENCH IN INDIANA 27 

absolutely on the fur trade. For that reason the trade was 
well guarded. The Indian country was divided into dis- 
tricts comparing approximately with the divisions agreed 
upon by the tribes themselves. To each district or tribe 
certain traders were given the exclusive right to trade and 
no other allowed to encroach. Each trader was encouraged 
to establish a post as his headquarters and encourage the 
Indians to come there to trade. The trader lived among 
his tribesmen, studied their wants and catered to their 
humor. The missionary was always present as a check on 
the trader.-" 

27 Carter. Great Britain and the Illinois Country, 84. 



CHAPTER II 
the english period, 1763-1778 

§ 7 The English Conquest and Government 

The war between the English and French for the pos- 
session of the Ohio Valley was essentially a commercial 
struggle for the fur trade. The French interpreted the 
Treaty of Aix la Chapeile to confirm them in the owner- 
ship of the valley. The Marquis de la Galissoniere, the 
governor of Canada, began at once, after receiving news 
of the treaty, to secure the French interests. ^ 

The English as early as 1720 were jealous of the en- 
croachments of the French along the Ohio river. Governor 
Burnett of New York advised the Lords of Trade, Novem- 
ber 20, 1720, to forestall them or the English would not 
only lose the trade of the country but the valley itself.- 

Early in 1749 the French governor sent Captain Bien- 
ville de Celoron with a strong party of French and Indians 
on a mission to the Ohio. At Logstown, about twenty miles 
below the present site of Pittsburg, Bienville gathered the 
Indians together and instructed them as to the power and 
rights of the French. On his way down the Ohio he picked 
up a number of English traders and at an old Shawnee 
village on the Ohio released them with instructions to return 
beyond the mountains. At the same time he addressed 
notes to Governor Hamilton at Philadelphia and Governor 
Clinton at New York advising them of the trespasses of the 
traders and threatening to treat all such persons in the fu- 
ture as interlopers. This valiant Knight of the Order of St. 

1 For a good account of the Ohio Valley and its strategic importance 
see the GoA'eruor's report for 1750. DocumentK Relating to the Colonial 
History of New York, X,"229. 

'■^Documents Relating to the Colonial Bislortj of New York, V, 576. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 29 

Louis then proceeded on down the Ohio burying on its banks 
leaden plates bearing a proclamation of ownership from 
King Louis XV. 

Hardly had Celoron passed on his way down the Ohio 
river when George Croghan, an agent of Governor Hamil- 
ton of Pennsylvania, appeared among the Indians and con- 
tradicted what the Frenchman had proclaimed.^ 

The correspondence of the French and English officers 
and their agents is full of hints of intrigue, murder, and 
bloody foray, incited by partisan leaders or abetted by 
promises of reward. No Indian chief was safe from the 
murderous weapons of his tribesmen. Every village had its 
English and its French faction. A part of the hunters of 
each tribe traded with the English, a part with the French. 

Governor Galissoniere recommended to Count Maurepas 
that he send 300 or 400 good soldiers to the posts on the 
Wabash in 1748. Ensign Douville of Post Miamis, who was 
conducting a party of Miamis under Chiefs Coldfoot and 
Hedgehog down to Montreal, was stopped at Niagara by 
a war party of Mohawks. Douville stated that the English 
had offered a snug reward to La Demoiselle, a Miami chief 
on the Scioto, if he would bring Douville's head to the 
English governor. 

Ensign Chevalier de La Peyrode, the commandant at 
Ouiatanon, started in August, 1748, with a large party of 
Weas on a visit to Montreal but was driven back by the 
Hurons, then friendly to the English. Sieur Laperriere 
Marin, commandant among the Miamis at St. Joseph, also 
stated that English emissaries had been among the Miamis 
and Pottawattomies of his post poisoning their minds 
against the French. Scores of traders lost their lives in 
trying to carry on trade under such conditions. French 
partisans in the paint and feathers of warriors led the 
savages in long expeditions against the English frontiers. 

In 1750 Colonel William Johnson, Indian agent for Great 
Britain, complained to the Lords of Trade that the French 

3 The best source for this struggle is the Documents Relating to the 
Colonial History of New York, index; aud Croghau's Journal in Early 
Western Travels, I, 45. 



30 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

were encouraging the Lake Indians to make war on the 
English allies on the Ohio. In May, 1753, Commander Hol- 
land at Oswego reported that thirty French canoes, part 
of a force said to number 6,000 under Monsieur Marin, 
had passed that place on their way to the Ohio. Close after 
them came the report that six Englishmen and fourteen 
friendly Indians had been killed on the Ohio. These instan- 
ces are enough to show the conditions that prevailed in the 
western country from 1748 to the breaking out of war in 
1755. 

The church records of Vincennes during this period 
commence with the marriage record of a Canadian French- 
man and a French-Indian girl, written by the officiating 
priest, Sebastian Louis Meurin. There is little of historical 
interest in this early record of baptisms, marriages and 
burials. Father Meurin was succeeded by Louis Vivier, 
also a Jesuit, who remained until 1756 ; when he was suc- 
ceeded by Julian Duvernay, the last of the Jesuits, who re- 
mained until France gave up the territory in 1763. 

The Illinois mission, of which Vincennes was a part, was 
badly neglected during these and succeeding years, John 
Baptist Lamorinie was stationed at Post St. Joseph as mis- 
sionary to the Miamis. Pierre du Jaunay was transferred 
from the Miamis to Ouiatanon about 1745. He returned to 
Quebec about 1754. He seems to have been the only mis- 
sionary who ever resided at Ouiatanon. Marchand de Lig- 
neris was in command of the garrison at Ouiatanon at the 
same time.^ 

The echoes of the seven years of French and Indian 
warfare were scarcely heard in this land of savages, French 
peasants, and coureurs de hois. Many of the Miamis helped 
Beaujeu in the destruction of Braddock, and doubtless many 
young warriors joined in the raids on the Virginia and 
Pennsylvania frontier. Although the war did not reach the 
inhabitants of this remote wilderness the peace at the close 
of the war roused them to fury. 

By the surrender of Montreal, 1760, the French gave 
up this western territory to the English. The French gar- 

4 Rev. Herman Alerding, The Diocese of Vincennes, 58. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 31 

risons were to be withdrawn and the posts delivered over 
to the English as soon as possible. The duty of carrying 
out this decree fell on Colonel Robert Rogers ; for that pur- 
pose he left Montreal, September 13, 1760, with about 200 
men in boats. These were the famous Rogers Rangers, the 
terror of the Indians on the New England border. No body 
of English troops having ever penetrated so far west, their 
coming excited alarm among the savages. Pontiac met 
Rogers on the south shore of Lake Erie. After some hesi- 
tation the Indian chief gave his permission for the English 
to pass on to Detroit. On November 29, 1760, the lilies of 
France ceased to wave over Detroit. Detachments of the 
Sixtieth English Regiment came and took possession of 
Ouiatanon and Post Miamis, in what is now Indiana. The 
other western posts on the Great Lakes were not occupied 
till the following spring. All told, there were about six 
hundred English soldiers stationed west of Pennsylvania.^ 

§ 8 PoNTiAc's War 

The English soldiers, and especially the English traders, 
were extremely offensive to the Indians. The soldiers re- 
fused to mingle with the Indians, refused to sell them guns 
and ammunition, and refused to allow them to loaf inside 
the forts. The English fur traders, taken by and large, 
were the worst class of men in America. They had the 
characteristic commercial disregard of sentiment. To them 
the Indian was a very inferior being, to be cheated, out- 
raged, robbed or murdered as best suited their money- 
making purposes. The traders had no regard for the help- 
less settlers on the frontier so long as they themselves es- 
caped with plunder and life. We have to turn to Simon 
Legree, the villain slave-master of literature, to find a com- 
parison. If it were necessary to go further to explain this 
sudden uprising of the Indians in Pontiac's war, one might 
point out the long and intimate friendship of the French 
traders with the Indians, the natural result of which was to 
prejudice the Indians against the English. 

5 Avery, A History of the United States, IV, 354. 



32 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The news of the treaty, ceding all the western country 
to the English without so much as consulting the Indians, 
brought all this sullen hatred to a head. The Senecas in 
the east and the Ottawa-Ojibwa-Pottawattomie confederacy 
in the west, organized the attack. Their plan, briefly, was 
to capture Fort Pitt and Detroit, together with the smaller 
posts, after which they would throw all their force against 
the English frontier and drive the white people into the 
sea. Pontiac, the Ottawa chief, was the soul of the league 
and one of the greatest of American Indians.^ 

Early on the morning of May 7, 1763, a party of Indians 
in canoes crossed from the Canadian shore to Detroit and 
stalked with apparent unconcern up to the palisades of the 
fort. It was the first act in a bloody siege that lasted 
throughout the summer. First, the garrison of Detroit was 
forced to see the dead bodies of a relief party, 60 or 80 in 
number, gashed and mutilated with knife and fire, float 
past the fort. Hardly had this horror ended when a long 
line of naked Wyandotte warriors, painted black, paraded 
in front of the fort, each decorated with a ghastly scalp. It 
was the news from the Sandusky, Ohio, garrison, butchered 
May 16. A month later, June 15, a band of Pottawattomies 
came to the fort bringing Ensign Schlosser, who, with 
fourteen men, had been stationed at Fort St. Joseph, at the 
mouth of the river St. Joseph. The same tale of treachery 
and slaughter was repeated. On June 18, news was brought 
by a Jesuit priest that the Chippewas and Ojibways had 
surprised the post at Michillimacinac, slain its garrison, 
and captured its commander. Captain George Etherington. 
Soon after this came came a letter from Lieutenant Edward 
Jenkins of Ouiatanon. On the morning of June 1, the lieu- 
tenant had been invited to their hut by some friendly In- 
dians. The Kickapoos, Mascoutins, Piankeshaws, and Weas. 

6 "This Indian has a more extensive power than ever was Ijnown 
among that people; for every chief used to command his own tribe; 
but eighteen nations, by French intrigue had been brought to unite, 
and choose this man for commander, after the English had conquei'ed 
Canada; having been taught to believe that, aided by France, they 
might make a vigorous push and drive us out of America." Thomas 
Morris's Journal in Early Western Travels, I, 305. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 



33 



FRANiaiN 



{ 
i 


GIBSON 




WASHINGTON 


^ 




/ 


7 


k 


r^ 

"} 


PERRY 


HARRISON 

9^ 


POSEY 


WARRICK 


^ 



JEFFERSON 



DEARBORN 



1 



SWITZER- 
LAND 



CLARK 



INDIANA Counties, 1S14. By E. V. Shockley. 



34 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

together with a few French families, then lived near this 
post. As soon as Jenkins had reached the place, the In- 
dians seized and bound him as they had done several of 
his soldiers. They had then forced him to surrender the 
rest of the garrison. Here, however, the rule had been 
broken and the prisoners had been placed in the house of 
a French trader, where they were well cared for. It seems, 
however, that this leniency was a second thought, due per- 
haps to the French traders, Lorain and Maisonirtle ; for the 
Indians later made known a plan which they had formed 
to kill all the garrison the previous night. Either the order 
for attack did not reach the Indians in time, having re- 
ceived the wampum belt after dark the night before, or 
the French traders prevented the bloodshed. Jenkins re- 
mained a prisoner at Ouiatanon till after August 1, not 
knowing what hour he might be put to death. This post 
was destroyed by the Indians and never rebuilt.'^ 

Next came the report from Fort Miami, at the junction 
of the St. Joseph and the St. Mary, where the city of Fort 
Wayne nov»^ stands. Its commander, Ensign Holmes, had 
been put on his guard ; but on May 27, 1763, he was betrayed 
to a neighboring house by a young squaw, who lived with 
him, and shot down from ambush by two Indians. The 
girl's story was that in the wigwam a short distance from 
the fort was a sick woman, her mother, who needed his at- 
tention. The officer put on his coat and accompanied the 
girl across the meadow to the hut. Just as they were enter- 
ing the door two Indians stepped from behind the wigwam, 
fired and the ensign fell dead. His head was cut off and 
carried back to the fort. The sergeant who heard the shots, 
on running outside the gate to see vv^hat had happened, was 
seized and bound. When a Canadian named Godfrey then 
summoned the frightened soldiers to surrender in order to 
save their lives, they hastened to obey. Godfrey was a 
notorious French partisan. He had left Detroit with other 
Canadians soon after the siege began on the plea that he 
knew a French officer whom he could induce to come to De- 
troit and persuade Pontiac to quit the war. On the Maurnee 

7 Parkmau, The Conspiracy of Ponii'Jc, index. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 35 

he had robbed an English trader named John Welsh whom 
he sent to Detroit to be put to death. Godfrey was later 
captured and sentenced to death but pardoned on condition 
of his accompanying Tho mas M orris as an interpreter. All 
but one of the prisoners of Fort Miami were finally killed, 
many being tortured. When Morris visited the place in 
September of the following year one of them was still a 
prisoner, held for sacrifice. He was later adopted as a 
son by a squaw whose son was killed in the war. 

The post at Vincennes had never been turned over to 
the English. History has left us only meager accounts of 
what befell the English traders caught up in this whirlwind 
of savage anger. Our sympathy goes out to the British 
soldiers, only a handful in number, stationed one thousand 
miles away from any point of supply or reinforcement, and 
wholly unfitted by their training for such service.*' 

The fury of Pontiac's army wore itself out against the 
palisades of Detroit. Col. John Bradstreet with English 
reinforcements reached the fort in August, 1764. A sol- 
dier, Capt. Thomas Morris, was sent by Bradstreet on a 
mission up the Maumee to where Pontiac had withdrawn 
his bafiied host. On every hand he saw evidences of the 
ravages made by the Indians. One Indian boasted that he 
was riding Braddock's horse, a large dapple iron gray. 
Another offered Morris a volume of Shakespeare for some 
gunpowder. All the tribesmen were in bad humor. Mor- 
ris found Fort Miami abandoned except for some renegade 
French traders who made the deserted barracks their home. 
A Kickapoo village occupied the meadow around the post. 
The main Miami village was across the St. Joseph river, 
northeast of the fort. Ottawa, Wea, Mascoutin and Dela- 
ware Indians mingled in the neighborhood in inextricable 
confusion. He also found the Delaware, Shawnee and 
Wyandotte Indians in little humor for peace. After being 
twice tied to the stake for torture, he escaped to Detroit. 
He had a letter to St. Ange at Fort Chartres, but his 

s Parkmnn. The Conspiracy of Pontiac, I, 27S ; Early Western 
Travels, I. 312. 



36 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

friends advised him that he would certainly be killed at 
Ouiatanon. He entrusted his letter to St. Vincent, a 
Frenchman, then fighting with the Indians. The double- 
dealing of the tribes and the hostility of the French were 
apparent. While making pretenses of friendship to Brad- 
street at Sandusky they were sending war belts to the 
Miamis, Kickapoos and Illinois. But the Indians soon had 
a different man to deal with.'^ 

The marauding along the borders of Pennsylvania and 
Virginia continued. It was thought that fully three hun- 
dred whites were in captivity among the savages of Ohio 
and Indiana. In order to liberate these and punish the 
captors. Col. Henry Bouquet gathered a force at Fort Pitt 
in the fall of 1764. Besides the British regulars he had 
nearly 1,000 Pennsylvanians and 200 Virginia rangers. A 
rapid march brought him to the banks of the Muskingum 
in the heart of the Indian country. He summoned the 
Shawnee and Wyandotte warriors to his camp, ordered 
them to leave their chiefs with him as hostages, go back 
at once and bring all white people among them, whether 
captive or not, to him. Thoroughly alarmed, the Indians 
obeyed. A large number of men and women had accom- 
panied Colonel Bouquet in the hope of finding their long- 
lost relatives. The scene that followed the return of the 
Indians, bringing in 206 prisoners, was one of the most 
tragic ever witnessed on the American frontier. As fam- 
ilies were reunited, as wife and children were restored to 
husband and father, as mothers found their babes after 
years of captivity, and as others learned of the torture 
and death of their friends, their grief or joy was crush- 
ing. The humiliation of the Indian warriors was complete, 
even the sulky Delawares from the Scioto and White 
rivers bringing in their captives. ^'^ 

^ Early Western Travels, I. 295 scq. The full Jounml of Capt. 
Tbomas ]Morris is printed. It is the best source on this event. 

'^^ BouqveVs Expedition Against the Ohio Indians (Cincinnati, 1868). 
This is documentary. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 37 

§ 9 The Journey of George Croghan 

After an expedition had failed to reach the Illinois 
country by way of the Mississippi river in 1764, Gen. 
Thomas Gage, who commanded in America, determined to 
send a party to that region by way of Fort Pitt. For this 
purpose he chose the able Indian agent, George Croghan, 
deputy for Sir William Johnson, and the most experienced 
Indian agent on the western frontier. ^^ With a small 
party in two boats, he left Fort Pitt May 15, 1765, and in 
twenty-two days reached the mouth of the Wabash, not- 
ing carefully in his journal the appearance of the country 
and the attractions for settlers. The expedition was five 
days in passing down the Ohio river along the southern 
boundary of Indiana. The first night camp was made at 
the Falls. The river was very low and Croghan observed 
that the Falls were little more than a rapid, which could 
be passed easily at ordinary stages of water. At the mouth 
of the Wabash he found a breastwork built, as he sup- 
posed, by the Indians. The Wabash, he noted, ran through 
the finest countries of the world. Hemp, he observed, 
might be raised in immense quantities. All the bottoms 
were covered with red and white mulberry trees. Having 
dropped down the river a few miles lower to dispatch cour- 
iers to St. Ange at Chartres, the party was attacked about 
daybreak by a band of Kickapoos and Mascoutins. Two 
white men and three Indians were killed at the first fire, 
all the rest being wounded but two white men and one In- 
dian. At first the attacking party was mistaken for south- 
ern Indians, but as soon as the Shawnee guide recognized 
them he censured them boldly, telling them that all the 
northern Indians would band together to avenge the insult. 
The red warriors hurried their prisoners through the 
forest to Vincennes, where they arrived June 15. 

"On my arrival," wrote Croghan, "I found a village of 
about eighty or ninety French families settled on the east 

11 Croglian's Journal is priutecl in Documcuts Relating to the Colonial 
History of New Yor7t% VII, 779-7S8 ; Hildretl), Pioneer History of the 
Ohio Valley; Butler's History of Kentucky, appendix; Early Western 
Travels, I, 126. 

(4) 



38 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

side of the river, being one of the finest situations that can 
be found. The country is level and clear and the soil very- 
rich, producing wheat and tobacco. I think the tobacco 
better than that in Virginia. The French inhabitants 
hereabouts are an idle, lazy people, a parcel of renegados 
from Canada and much worse than the Indians. As the 
savages took from me a considerable quantity of gold and 
silver the French traders extorted from them $45 for a 
pound of Vermillion. Here is likewise a village of Pianke- 
shaws, who were much displeased with the party that took 
me, telling them they had started a war for which their 
women and children would have reason to cry. * * * 
Post Vincent is a place of great consequence for trade, be- 
ing a fine hunting country all along the Wabash and too 
far for the Indians who reside hereabouts to go either to the 
Illinois or elsewhere to fetch their necessaries." 

Croghan dispatched letters to St. Ange, commander at 
Fort Chartres, but he was not permitted to write to the 
English commander at Pittsburgh. He was convinced 
that the French at Vincennes were encouraging the Indians 
in their hostility to the English. The Kickapoos, it seems, 
delivered some scalps and a portion of the booty taken from 
Croghan's partj'' to the French and received the promised 
reward. The Piankeshaws refused to have anything to 
do with the Indians who had captured Croghan. 

Croghan left Vincennes June 17, on horseback. His 
way led through what is now Sullivan and Vigo counties, 
where he noted the great fertility of the meadows — the 
"Piankeshaw Hunting Grounds." On these prairies he saw 
bear, deer, and buffaloes in countless numbers. He reached 
Ouiatanon June 23, 1765. 

Ouiatanon was on the Wabash near where Lafayette 
now stands. There were fourteen French families in the 
stockade fort, which stood on the north side of the river. 
The Kickapoo and Mascoutin warriors who had captured 
Croghan lived in near-by villages. The older members of 
the Kickapoos censured the young bucks, but laid the blame 
on the French, who, they said, had planned the outrage. 
Croghan remarked on this occasion: "The French have 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 39 

a great influence over these Indians and never fail in tell- 
ing them many lies to the prejudice of his Majesty's inter- 
ests."^- The country roundabout was particularly fine. 
The post had always been a very considerable trading 
place; for the great plenty of furs had originally induced 
its establishment. Croghan said it was the first post built 
on the Wabash. As usual Croghan remarked the resources 
of the country. Across the river from the fort ran a high 
bank in which were several outcropping veins of coal. On 
top of the bluff were large meadows cleared for several 
miles. These had been called barren savannas, but at the 
time they were covered with wild hemp ten feet high. 

Croghan remained at Ouiatanon from June 23 to July 
25, meeting deputations from all the surrounding tribes 
and making treaties of peace. July 4 to 8 he was in con- 
ference with the Weas, Piankeshaws of Vermillion town, 
Kickapoos and Mascoutins. July 11 came the Illinois with 
Francois Maisonville as their interpreter. On the eight- 
eenth Croghan started to the Mississippi to meet Pontiac; 
but that chieftain with a large band of Senecas, Delawares 
and Shawnees was already near Ouiatanon and Croghan 
returned for a conference with them. Everything was 
arranged satisfactorily with them and treaties of peace 
confirmed. 

After settling everything with the natives, and being 
freed from his captors, Croghan left Ouiatanon July 25, 
1765, and proceeded up the Wabash to Eel river. Six miles 
up this stream he found a small Twightwee or Miami vil- 
lage pleasantly located on the river bank — the home of the 
Eel River Miamis. For four more days he traveled up Eel 
river, then crossed over to the portage path from the Wa- 
bash to the Maumee. On August 1 he reached the Miami 
village on the St. Joseph about one-fourth of a mile up from 
its mouth. The Indians came out to meet him, greeting 
him kindly. An old English flag which he had given them 
at Fort Pitt was hoisted. With most of the Twightwee or 
Miami warriors Croghan was personally acquainted. The 
navigation, he observed, from here to Ouiatanon was very 

12 Early Western Travels, I, 144. 



40 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

difficult in low water, but easy in times of freshet. Under 
the latter conditions the trip could be made in three days. 
On the east side of the river, near its mouth, stood a little 
tumbledown stockade — all that then remained of Post 
Miami. The Indian village consisted of forty or fifty 
cabins, together with nine or ten French houses occupied 
by French traders. Croghan again describes the French as a 
lazy, indolent, mischief-breeding pack. They were refu- 
gees from Detroit. They had aided the Indians in the late 
uprising and later, fearing punishment, had withdrawn to 
Post Miami. Croghan urged that they be removed where 
they would have no influence over the Indians. He was 
impressed with the natural resources and beauty of the 
country around Post Miami. After the usual conferences, 
and after the Indians had delivered up their prisoners, 
Croghan set out for Detroit August 6, having spent about 
three months among the inhabitants of the Wabash Valley. ^^ 

§ 10 England Takes Possession and Organizes the 

Country 

St. Ange had been governing the Illinois country since 
the departure of Neyon de Villiers in 1764. He was sur- 
rounded by a lawless crowd of thieving savages and con- 
spiring French. He had orders to surrender the post to 
the English as soon as they should appear. 

In January, 1764, Maj. Arthur Loftus set out from 
Mobile with 351 men from the Twenty-second Regiment. 
Sixty of them were to occupy Fort Massac and the re- 
mainder were to garrison Kaskaskia and Fort Chartres. 
This expedition was defeated and turned back by the 
Tonica Indians at Fort Adams, two hundred and forty 
miles above New Orleans. It was the encouragement from 
this defeat that impelled Pontiac to refuse the offers of 
Thomas Morris at Fort Miami in the autumn of 1764. ^^ In 
February, 1765, John Ross, an English officer, arrived at 
Fort Chartres from Mobile, having come directly north to 

13 Early Western Travels. I, 150. 

14 Carter. The IlUnois Count nj, 36. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 41 

the Ohio river and thence down to the Illinois Country. He 
was disappointed in the temper of the Indians and was for- 
tunate in escaping to New Orleans. 

Meanwhile the English at Fort Pitt were waiting 
eagerly to hear of the results of Croghan's expedition. As 
soon as the latter was sure of his position at Ouiatanon, he 
sent a messenger to Fort Pitt. Capt. Thomas Sterling was 
ready and at once set out from Fort Pitt to Fort Chartres, 
in Illinois, with 125 Scotch Highlanders of the Forty-second 
Regiment. Sterling arrived at Chartres October 9, 1765. 
St. Ange, the French commander, withdrew to the west side 
of the Mississippi, leaving all the northwest country in the 
hands of the English. The land of Indiana was under the 
jurisdiction of Captain Sterling. 

Fort Chartres was the largest of the French inland 
fortresses. It was a fortress, the others mere posts. It 
was designed to be the headquarters for the French civil 
and military command of the upper valley. It was built 
almost two miles from the banks of the Mississippi on the 
road from Kaskaskia to Cahokia, about twenty miles from 
the latter. The construction was begun in 1718 by Bois- 
briant, governor of Illinois, and finished in two or three 
years. It was built of stone with bastions and towers, 
donjon and magazine. Its portholes and heavy cannon 
were out of harmony v/ith its surroundings and an insult 
to the majestic river, on whose banks it stood. As if re- 
senting the intended domination the river set towards it, 
and seven years after the English took possession, under- 
mined its walls.i-^ A massive ruin still marks its location. 

There seemed no hurry to take possession of the Wa- 
bash posts. Not till 1777 was there any English authority 
on Indiana soil and the story of Indiana, meanwhile is in- 
separably woven into the larger politics of the Northwest. 

England found herself in possession of more territory 
at the close of the French and Indian War than her king 
and ministry could well govern. Their vast conquests in 
America were divided by the Proclamation of October 7, 

15 Carter, The Illinois Country, index; Winsor. Narrative and Critical 
History, VI, 702. 



42 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

1763, into four provinces: Quebec, East Florida, West 
Florida, Grenada. The territory north of the Ohio was 
not included in any one of these. An order of the king 
forbade the colonial governors to sell lands to anyone be- 
yond the headwaters of the rivers flowing into the Atlantic. 
This order came to be known as the "Proclamation of 
1763." Until the king's further pleasure was known the 
lands of the West were to be used, as formerly, as a hunt- 
ing ground for the Indians. 

This was only a temporary disposition of the vast royal 
domain. There was no manifest intention on the part of 
the ministry to set the designated region aside permanently 
as a home for the Indians. Such a policy would have been 
in direct violation of English precedents. On the other 
hand the brutal character of the traders and their capacity 
for stirring up the savages to war made some such effort 
necessary. All Indian traders were required by the procla- 
mation to be licensed and to give security for their good 
behavior. The purchase of land from the Indians on pri- 
vate account was strictly forbidden. All interlopers or 
trespassers were ordered to be seized and sent out of the 
country. The policy was timely, though some of its details 
could not be carried out.^^ 

Croghan's description of the fertile lands northwest of 
the Ohio roused the cupidity of the land-hungry English.^" 
One of the earliest of a series of giant land speculations 
was planned by Sir William Johnson, Indian agent for 
America, and Governor Franklin of New Jersey, a son of 
Benjamin Franklin. Governor Franklin wrote his father 
in London and the latter joined eagerly. General Gage and 
some wealthy Philadelphia merchants also entered into the 
scheme. They petitioned the king for a grant of 63,000,000 
acres lying between Lake Erie and the Mississippi and the 
Fox and Wisconsin rivers and the Ohio and Wabash. This 

16 The docnment is given, together with a map iu the Annual Regis- 
ter, 1763. 20S: Gentleman's Magazine, 1763, 477; Alvord, "Genesis of 
the Proclamation of 1763," in Michigan Pioneer and Historical Collec- 
tions, XXXVI, 25. 

17 The English magazines like the Gentleman's and the Annual Regis- 
ter give clear indications of this widespread interest. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 43 

settlement, they urged, would secure the country against 
a French uprising and also protect the western frontier 
from the Indians. Shelburne urged it upon the Board of 
Trade — especially emphasizing the necessity of a farming 
population to support the garrisons and at the same time 
to furnish a wider market for British manufactures. The 
Lords of Trade refused to grant the favor. The royal gov- 
ernors in America generally opposed it for the reason that 
it would only serve to draw men from the older colonies, 
thus weakening the already distressed colonial govern- 
ments. 

A second attempt was made by a company headed by the 
London banker, Thomas Walpole, and called the Walpole 
Company. Franklin was interested in this as well as George 
Washington, Governor Pownall of Massachusetts, Governor 
Dinwiddle of Virginia, and Col. George Mercer, then in 
London. The Tory colonial minister. Lord Hillsborough, 
had other plans, and not even the prophetic eloquence of 
Burke or the solid sense of Franklin could shake the stub- 
born minister. One of the tracts of lands compre- 
hended in this prospective grant of 2,400,000 acres was 
called "Indiana." In 1769 Dr. Lee of Virginia and thirty- 
two other Virginians, the great patriots of the Revolution, 
including the Washingtons, together with two Londoners, 
organized the Mississippi Land Company. The hope of the 
company was a grant of 2,500,000 acres of western lands 
around the mouths of the Ohio and Wabash rivers. The 
whole scheme ended in the pigeon holes of the Board of 
Trade. 

The Illinois Land Company through its agent, William 
Murray, a trader in the Illinois Country, acquired an Indian 
claim to two vast tracts bordering on the Mississippi and 
embracing the soil of half the present State of Illinois. The 
cession was obtained from ten Kaskaskia chieftains at a 
council held at Kaskaskia July 5, 1773, while Hugh Lord 
was the commandant. Two years later, Louis Viviat, an- 
other trader of the Illinois Country, bought for the Wabash 
Land Company a tract of land lying on both banks of the 
Wabash. This purchase comprehended about 60,000 square 



44 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

miles of territory. The price paid in each case was a few 
trinkets of trifling value. 

Several other land companies were organized during 
the period to exploit the fertile western lands. This spec- 
ulative fever has never left the American people in their 
dealings with the public lands. Nor must we forget in this 
connection that there was truth in the beautiful periods 
of Burke, who saw in vision the western waves of migra- 
tion lapping over the crests of the Alleghanies and trickling 
dovv^n the valleys beyond, oblivious of kings and procla- 
mations, i'' Thousands of hunters, traders and squatters 
crossed the Appalachians in defiance of law and made their 
homes in the Indian country. It was soon realized that 
the Proclamation of 1733 kept out only the best persons. 

Following the advice of Lord Hillsborough, v/ho, in turn, 
follov/ed Col. Guy Carleton, commander at Quebec, and his 
Svvdss lieutenant, Cramahe, the king decided on the Quebec 
Act as the one measure that would settle amicably all these 
American troubles. It would, he thought, pacify the 
French, who were the only legitimate settlers of the North- 
west, by giving them their French religion and civil law. 
It would give a government to the western country by plac- 
ing it under the jurisdiction of the Province of Quebec. 
It would also put an end to land speculations encouraged 
by royal governors. It v/as enacted in 1774. It did pacify 
Canada, and it gave a legality to government, but it utterly 
failed to stop western migration. It effectually destroyed 
the love of the leading Virginians for their king. More 
than any other act of the king, the Quebec Act prepared 
the Old Diminion for rebellion. By its terms all the lands 
north of the Ohio, east of the Mississippi and south of the 
Great Lakes were attached to Quebec. ^^ 

18 George Hetiry AJden, Neic Governments West of the Alleghanies 
Before 1780, in Bulletins of University of Wisconsin, II, gives a good 
discussion of these ianrl comrnnies. See liis references: also Cai'ter, 
TJie Illinois Country, cb. 6. Tlie petition of the Mississippi Company 
is given in the appendix to The Illinois Conntn/, ](!"). seq. 

19 See Statutes at Larue. Fourteenth George III, oh, 83. Most of the 
discussions in American history seem to have been by men who have not 
read the statute. Tliere is no ground in the law for anticip.iting the 
storm of opposition aroused in America. 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD 45 

During Pontiac's war the English were unable to relieve 
the French commanders in the Northwest. Neyon de Vil- 
liers was at Chartres and the veteran, St. Ange, at Vin- 
cennes. Villiers left his post early in 1764 for New Or- 
leans and with him went a large number of settlers. He 
ordered St. Ange to come and take charge of the fortress 
of Chartres. When the latter left Vincennes he turned the 
government of the post over to Deroite de Richardville. 
After taking possession of Chartres, the English were in 
no hurry to come to Vincennes; and nothing but the exig- 
encies of another war brought it a garrison. The stockade 
posts at Vincennes, Ouiatanon and Post Miami rotted down 
and disappeared. A more forlorn settlement could not have 
been found in America than those on the soil of Indiana 
just preceding the Revolution. Authority at Vincennes 
finally settled down to the notary, Raumer, who ran away 
with the records. To add to their misery the settlers re- 
ceived orders from General Gage, toward the close of 1772, 
to vacate the territory; for it had been temporarily set 
aside by the Proclamation of 1763 as a hunting ground for 
the Indians. It seemed the settlement would disappear, 
and the valley of the Wabash revert entirely to its ancient 
savagery. The fur trade became more and more lawless 
and unprofitable. Fortunately the order of General Gage 
was not approved by the king and the inhabitants were 
not molested. 

By the Quebec Act Vincennes came under the jurisdic- 
tion of the commander of Detroit. Accordingly, early in 
1777 — there seemed no great hurry — Lieutenant Governor 
Abbott was sent by Governor Hamilton from Detroit to re- 
build the stockades on the Wabash, and organize a band 
of French chasseurs to attack the back settlements of Vir- 
ginia. Abbott found large numbers of Indians, whom he 
encouraged in their murderous raids on the western fron- 
tier; but the French had no stomachs to join England 
against the Americans. Abbott built a stockade fort at 
Vincennes and mounted some cannons, sent over by Roche- 
blave from Fort Gage, formerly Chartres, at Kaskaskia. 
He remained and governed the people till January 30, 1778, 



46 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

when he returned to Canada, leaving Vincennes to fall help- 
lessly into the hands of Virginia. 

The only business of the country worth mentioning was 
the fur trade. Under the provisions of the Proclamation 
of 1763 only English traders were allowed in the field. 
Each trader was required to have a license from a colonial 
governor. A superintendent of Indian affairs for the coun- 
try north of the Ohio had charge. The commissary at each 
post was a petty justice with jurisdiction over the petty 
quarrels arising among the traders. Effort was made to 
center the trade as much as possible around the garrison 
post. At each post was a commissary, an interpreter, and 
a smith. The commissary and superintendent had power 
to establish a uniform price for all goods used in the trade. 
For all their plans and pains the fur trade was a lawless 
business engaged in by the English, French and Spanish, 
with and without license. Liquor was carried into the 
western forests by every avenue. Indians were made drunk, 
maltreated and left to take vengeance on helpless pioneer 
families.20 

20 Carter, The Illinois Cotmtry, ch. V. 



CHAPTER III 

the conquest by virginia 1778-1779 

§ 11 The American Revolution and the Indians 

Scarcely had the American Revolution broken out 
when the English began to utilize the warlike energy of 
the Indians against their rebellious colonists. King George 
had in 1763 by a royal proclamation set aside temporarily 
the vast valleys west of the mountains as a hunting ground 
for his red children. He had ordered the colonists to stay 
on the eastern side of the mountains. But as soon as the 
French and Indian war had ended, bands of settlers began 
to locate in the valleys of the westward-flowing rivers. In 
a vain attempt to stay this tide of migration the Indians 
had sustained the crushing defeat at Point Pleasant, Vir- 
ginia, 1774, and the loss in that battle of some of their 
bravest chiefs. 

Early in the Revolutionary War the Tories of western 
New York had united with the British agents in raising 
the powerful Iroquois. The terrible devastation of the Wy- 
oming and Cherry Valleys followed. That western Indians 
engaged in these raids is shown by the fate of Frances 
Slocum, who was captured by the Miamis and brought to 
their home on the Mississinewa.^ The destruction of the 
Iroquois Confederacy by General Sullivan in 1779 drove the 
wreck of that nation, together with the Delaware refugees, 
back on the Miami tribes, with whom they later joined in 
war against the Americans. 

Col. Henry Hamilton was the English commander at De- 
troit. On him falls the disgrace of arousing the western 
Indians against Virginia. He advised Lord George Ger- 

1 Jacob Piatt Dunn, True Indian mories, 213. 



48 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

maine, the English war minister, to furnish arms and am- 
munition as well as suitable leaders for the Indians, and 
directed them to make a diversion on the Virginia and 
Pennsylvania frontiers. The Indians were placed in com- 
mand of such partisan outlaws as Capt. Henry Bird, and 
Simon Girty, and then ordered to do no violence. They 
were directed to watch the Ohio river especially and de- 
stroy all Americans attempting to pass. Hamilton report- 
ed that the Indians in his district, Detroit, had brought in 
107 prisoners and 110 scalps during the year 1778. These 
were paid for by the commander as if they had been so 
many beaver skins. The leading tribe engaged in these 
depredations was the Miami, whose home was on the soil 
of Indiana. They had no reason to join in the contest be- 
tween England and her colonies. There had been war 
along the border, but it had been led by his Majesty the 
King's officers, and the resentment of the Indians should 
have fallen as quickly on the British as the Americans. 
The ruin of the northwestern tribes may be traced back 
to this unnatural policy of the British in 1776. 

§ 12 The Capture of Kaskaskia 

Among the American frontiersmen there was only one 
sentiment toward the Indians. That was retaliation. For 
awhile their vengeance fell on the Indians alone. Such 
men as Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton, Lewis "Wetzel and 
Adam Poe hunted the Indians as they had hunted the wild 
animals. Meanwhile dangers, instead of lessening, multi- 
plied on the frontier. It is to the credit of George Rogers 
Clark that he not only recognized the English, at the west- 
ern posts, as the source of the devastation on the frontiers, 
but he laid plans to capture them. 

Clark was one of the early settlers of Kentucky. When 
a county government was organized by the Kentuckians, he 
first represented it in the Virginia legislature. It was not 
primarily as a legislator that he visited the government of 
Virginia in the closing days of 1777. December 10 of that 
year he laid before Governor Patrick Henry of Virginia 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 49 

his plan for conquering the English posts. Virginia was 
using her means and men freely in supporting Washington 
in the struggle around New York, but Governor Henry- 
could not fail to catch the spirit of Clark and sympathize 
with his hopes. After calling into consultation three of 
the leading men of the State, he gave Clark permission to 
enroll seven companies of militia and draw on the State 
for 12,000 pounds to defray expenses. Clark thus prepared 
not only to stop the inroads of the Indians, but at the same 
time to conquer for his State a western empire. 

Colonel Clark was given two sets of instructions. One, 
intended for the public, and especially for the Virginia 
legislature, directed him to repair to Kentucky with his 
army to defend the new settlements against the savages. 
The other instructions directed him to organize his army 
with all secrecy and dispatch for an attack on Kaskaskia 
or Vincennes. With characteristic quickness Clark made 
his preparations and set out for Pittsburgh January 4, 
1778. He authorized his old friends and neighbors, Leon- 
ard Helm and Joseph Bowman, each to raise a company 
and join him on February 1 at Redstone Old Fort. Wil- 
liam Smith was likewise sent to recruit a company on the 
Holston and join the other troops at the Falls of the Ohio. 
Nearer the frontier, Clark secured the services of Capt. 
William Harrod, who also raised a company, part of whom 
were from Pennsylvania. The Old Dominion furnished 
m.any gallant soldiers during the Revolution, but none were 
better than these modern Argonauts who set sail from 
Pittsburgh in May, 1778, to capture a fortress 1,000 miles 
away. Each man was a skillful hunter, an accurate marks- 
man with his flintlock rifle, and accustomed to long jour- 
neys and all kinds of privations. Nearly all were Vir- 
ginians, the leaders as well as most of the men being old 
acquaintances. Fear was unknown to them and yet, like 
brave men, they were cautious. 

Clark broke up his rendezvous at Redstone May 12, 
1778. At Pittsburgh and Wheeling he stopped on his way 
and took on supplies. Gen. Edward Hand, who command- 
ed at Pittsburgh, gave all assistance he could. At the 



50 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Kanawha, Clark found the garrison in consternation over 
an Indian attack and was earnestly besought to join in the 
pursuit. He was not to be turned aside from his purpose, 
however, and continued on his way down the Ohio, followed 
and harassed every mile by the Indians, but never caught 
off his guard. At the mouth of the Kentucky he stopped 
and communicated with the settlements up that river, but 
decided to go on further and build the fortification for his 
base of supplies at the Falls. From this post he could more 
easily check Indian incursions from the north side of the 
Ohio. He reached the Falls about June 1. Besides the sol- 
diers, there was a number of families who had wished to 
come to Kentucky and had chosen this opportunity in order 
to avoid the murderous bands of Indians who then infested 
all the roads to that country. Some of these were doubt- 
less the families of soldiers enlisted under Clark. After 
looking over the situation carefully, Clark decided to for- 
tify Corn Island, just at the head of the Falls and nearest 
the Kentucky side. The land on the island he divided 
among the families, who soon had a crop of corn growing. 

Clark now began in earnest to drill his little army for 
the desperate work ahead. Disappointed in the number 
of men from the Holston country who joined him here, he 
found it necessary to call for aid on the Kentucky govern- 
ment, by whom another company, under Capt. John Mont- 
gomery, was ordered to report to him. All told. Colonel 
Clark now found himself in command of about 200 men. 
Having drilled them nearly a month, he called them to- 
gether and informed them of his plans. The following 
night a large number of the Holston men swam to the Ken- 
tucky bank and left for home. 

The remainder, about 175, started for Kaskaskia on the 
morning of June 24, a date made certain by the total eclipse 
of the sun that occurred that morning. Everything now 
depended on speed and secrecy. There was no doubt but 
that in a fight his men would give a good account of them- 
selves, but Clark was convinced that his only chance to 
capture Kaskaskia was by surprise. The Ohio river was 
then at good stage. The troops, doubling on the oars. 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 51 

rowed day and night. June 28 they landed on a small isl- 
and in the mouth of the Tennessee, where they quickly pre- 
pared for a dash across Illinois. It was thought to be im- 
possible to ascend the Mississippi without being discovered 
by some of the numerous traders or Indians passing up 
and down on that river. 

Clark had scarcely landed at the mouth of the Tennes- 
see, when a boat appeared with a party of hunters in it eight 
days only from Kaskaskia. Some, or perhaps all of them, 
joined the Virginians, and one of them, John Saunders, 
became the guide. After making every preparation and 
taking only as much baggage as if they were going on a 
hunting trip, the little army dropped down to within three 
miles of the deserted Fort Massac, hid their boats in a 
creek, and took the trail for Old Kaskaskia. The distance 
was about 120 miles. On the level prairies they were in 
danger of losing their way and only the experienced guide 
saved them from wandering. They made remarkable time, 
however. They left the Falls June 24, reached the Ten- 
nessee on the twenty-eighth, went on and hid their boats 
the same day. On the morning of the twenty-ninth they 
set out on the march and on the evening of July 4 reached 
Kaskaskia. If Colonel Clark is correct in saying he left 
the Falls on the twenty-sixth, the march is even more re- 
markable. In the first case they had traversed at least 400 
miles in ten days. Through the wilderness of Illinois they 
traveled twenty-five miles per day. 

Colonel Clark had sent spies to the Illinois Country dur- 
ing the summer of 1777 and these had encouraged him to 
believe he could surprise the fort at Kaskaskia. The hunt- 
ers whom he had intercepted at the Tennessee also reported 
the garrison negligent in keeping lookouts. The French 
inhabitants were reported to be lukewarm in the British 
cause. There is good ground for the belief that Clark had 
confederates in the town who knew of his approach and 
had made preparations accordingly. At any rate, relying 
on this known friendly feeling among the French, Clark 
led his men to a farmhouse within a mile of the town but 
on the east side of the river, and finding boats ready to 



52 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

hand, crossed over, reaching the outskirts of the town soon 
after dark. The conduct of the American soldiers on this 
occasion would have been creditable to regulars. They 
remained in the immediate vicinity until near midnight 
without being observed or creating any alarm. At that 
time they quietly secured all the approaches to the village, 
entered the fort, now called Fort Gage, and seized the com- 
mander, Philip de Rocheblave, whom they found asleep in 
his room. This done, there was noise enough. The citi- 
zens w^ere warned to keep off the streets and all were led 
to believe that an army of 1,000 men had possession. Thus 
without bloodshed, without the firing of a gun, even with- 
out a surrender, for Rocheblave and his men were spared 
that humiliation, this fortress, that had sufficient garrison 
and supplies to withstand a siege by a regiment of men, 
fell into the hands of less than 200 militia who had no 
other arms than their hunting rifles. Tradition has woven 
some beautiful stories around this feat of arms, but no 
authentic account gives any details. Most probably ene- 
mies of the English commandant joined Clark after dark 
and acted as guides.^ 

§ 13 Pierre Gibault and the Capture of Vincennes 

As has alv/ays been the case in rural French villages, 
the priest was the principal man of the community. In 
their distress, now, the parishioners of Kaskaskia turned 
to Father Pierre Gibault, the priest. His request to call 
his people together once more before they were taken away 
as prisoners, for they expected to be driven away at last 
as the Acadians had been, was so readily granted by 
Colonel Clark that the priest at once became an admirer 
of the Virginian. When Clark, soon after, informed him 
that the French would not be molested in any manner, not 
even in the free exercise of their religion, the priest felt 
that it would be to his interest to aid the Virginians in all 

'■^ I'hUippe dc RocJichhirc and Roclicblarc Papers, Fergus Historical 
Scries, No. 34. The weakness of the garrison is apparent. An ac- 
count of the capture is given in the Laicrencchurg Palladium, March 20, 
1830. 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 53 

ways possible. He did this the more graciously since he 
had no sympathy either for the English personally or for 
their cause. Accordingly, when he learned that the Ameri- 
can commander was contemplating an attack on Vin- 
cennes, he volunteered to go and win the French over to 
the American cause. Clark had brought with him a copy 
of the recent Treaty of Alliance between France and the 
American Nation, which was now a great aid in dealing 
with the French at Kaskaskia and Vincennes. 

As soon as Clark had secured all the other Illinois set- 
tlements he turned his attention to Vincennes. Gibault 
informed him that Abbott, the English commander, had 
lately gone to Detroit and that there was, at the time, no 
English garrison at the Old Post. Moreover, he said that 
he believed he could go to that place and by presenting 
the treaty between the two countries and explaining the 
courteous treatment received by the Kaskaskians, win them 
over to the American side. But Father Gibault, not wish- 
ing to seem to act in other than a spiritual capacity, asked 
that some one be allowed to accompany him to act as the 
political agent. However, he assured Clark that he would 
attend personally to all the details of the business. As a 
companion on this embassy with Father Gibault, Dr. Jean 
Laffont was chosen. Gibault has, heretofore, received all 
the credit for this achievement, but the letter to the inhab- 
itants, as well as the instructions, was given to Laffont. 
The report to Clark attributes all the work at Vincennes to 
Laffont, while Gibault, ten years later, in a letter to his 
bishop at Quebec, denied having taken any hand in winning 
the Vincennes people from the British allegiance. Doubtless 
all the French needed was an opportunity to desert their 
hereditary foes. A friend of Colonel Clark secretly ac- 
companied the delegation. Clark prepared an address to 
the French authorizing and directing them to organize 
their own militia and garrison the fort. 

Thus prepared, this little party set out from Kaskaskia, 
July 14, to capture Vincennes, a post which Clark had 
feared to approach a fortnight earlier. The English along 
the whole northern border had been momentarily discon- 

(5) 



54 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

certed by the capture of General Burgoyne at Saratoga. 
They were now expecting the Americans to attack Detroit 
from Pittsburgh. The reverse had thrown them on the 
defensive, for the time, and all but destroyed their prestige 
among the Indians. On this account Laffont and Father 
Gibault found no British troops at Vincennes and likewise 
none of their Indian allies. A few partisans had been left 
as spies by Abbott, but these withdrew as soon as they 
learned the purpose of Laffont and the attitude of the 
French inhabitants. Gibault found no difficulty in per- 
suading his parishioners. Two days after he arrived he 
called his little flock together in the village church, w^here 
in sacred solemnity he administered to them the oath of 
allegiance to the United States. The animating effects of 
freedom were seen immediately. A garrison under an of- 
ficer of popular choice was stationed in the fort. The 
American flag was displayed from the staff of the fort to 
the wondering Indians. By August 1 Laffont and Gibault 
were back at Kaskaskia with the good news. Communica- 
tions with Kentucky were now established and Clark felt 
reasonably secure in his conquests. 

This series of remarkable successes might have thrown 
a less vigilant commander than Clark off his guard, but 
there was no time for nursing his vanity. He now con- 
trolled three considerable towns each requiring a garrison. 
Governor Henry, indeed, had so worded Clark's instruc- 
tions as to leave him at liberty to dismantle the forts and 
return with the captured cannon to the fort at the Falls 
of the Ohio, but this would have reduced the whole enter- 
prise from a magnificent conquest to an unexpectedly suc- 
cessful Indian foray. Such an idea was a stranger to 
Clark's ambition. To hold the conquests already achieved 
would require a full regiment, and the time of service of 
the small number of men then in Illinois would expire 
within a few days. Clark prevailed on most of them to re- 
enlist, and sent those who wished to return home to con- 
duct the prisoners to Virginia. The places of those who 
did not reenlist were quickly filled by French volunteers. 
Maj. Joseph Bowman, a cousin of Colonel Clark, was sent 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 55 

with a small garrison to take charge of Cahokia. Capt. 
John Williams was placed in immediate command of Fort 
Gage at Kaskaskia. The most dangerous command was 
assigned to Capt. Leonard Helm, the oldest and most ex- 
perienced of this little group of officers. Helm was a Vir- 
ginian, perhaps forty years old, who had spent most of 
his life as a scout among the Indians. He understood In- 
dian character and was well suited for the difficult com- 
mand at Vincennes. 

A few Americans and Creoles constituted his garrison. 
The French received their new commandant joyfully and 
the Piankeshaw chief. Tobacco, or the "Grand Door," as 
he was also called, in allusion to his tribe's position at 
the mouth of the Wabash, was soon in league with the Vir- 
ginians. Indian chiefs came from many of the neighbor- 
ing tribes and made peace with the Americans, but the In- 
dians of the Upper Wabash remained hostile. Their atti- 
tude was traced to the influence of the British agent, Pierre 
Joseph Celoron, who was at this time stationed at Ouia- 
tanon. Clark determined to capture this man or drive him 
away. For this purpose he sent Capt. John Bailey to join 
Helm in an expedition to the Wea Towns. When Celoron 
heard of this he fled, leaving his Indian allies to their fate. 
Helm surprised the stockade at Ouiatanon while the In- 
dians v/ere in council, and captured the larger part of them. 
After making a treaty of friendship with them he released 
his prisoners and returned to Vincennes. 

Made bold by the impunity with which he had carried 
on his operations against the western settlers, and know- 
ing something must be performed to restore British su- 
premacy over the natives, Lieut, Henry Hamilton was pre- 
paring to make an attack on Fort Pitt, when, on August 8, 
1778, Francis Maisonville arrived at Detroit with the 
astounding intelligence that 300 Virginians had surprised 
and captured the garrison at Kaskaskia. Hamilton at 
once notified Gen. Guy Carleton at Quebec of the disaster 
and asked permission to march against the Virginians at 
once. He was a man of great energy, and without wait- 
ing for orders from his superior at Quebec began collect- 



56 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ing men and supplies for the expedition. Agents were 
sent with war belts to all the friendly tribes. One of them, 
carried by Celoron, we have already met at Ouiatanon. 

By October 7 the British expedition against Vincennes 
was under way. It numbered about 200 British and French 
and 300 Indians. Crossing Lake Erie in a snowstorm that 
all but wrecked the boats, the troops ascended the Maumee. 
On the twenty-fourth they reached the portage at Fort 
Wayne. Progress was slow. They carried 97,000 pounds 
of baggage. The rivers were low and the ice had already 
formed on the Upper Wabash. The boats grounded and 
the baggage had to be carried for long distances over the 
shallows. The historian is tempted to say that the British 
armies would have been successful in the Revolution had 
it not been for their baggage trains. The fleet of fifteen 
large bateaux at last reached Ouiatanon, where the com- 
mander delayed long enough to hold a formal council with 
the Indians. Small scouting parties were sent ahead to 
watch all the approaches to Vincennes and cut off all com- 
munication. These parties succeeded in capturing Cap- 
tain Helm's scouts. 

Learning from them that the garrison at Vincennes 
was not strong enough to resist an attack, Major Hay was 
sent in advance to occupy the town. He decided not to 
attack the fort at once, and by the time the main British 
force arrived, Helm's garrison, if he ever had one, had 
melted away. Captain Helm reported that when the Brit- 
ish came in sight he had not so much as four men on whom 
he could rely. Presumably his garrison, realizing the use- 
lessness of an attempt at resistance, mingled with the in- 
habitants and later joined Clark when he came to the res- 
cue. There was no opposition. Captain Helm made the 
best bluff possible with his one small cannon and then sur- 
rendered at discretion. The surrender took place Decem- 
ber 17, 1778. The British had made the distance of over 
500 miles in seventy-two days, an average of seven miles 
per day. 

Again the Frenchmen of Vincennes were called to- 
gether and the oath of allegiance to Great Britain admin- 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 



57 




58 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

istered, Hamilton destroyed all the liquor, and even the 
gaming tables, in town, and placed the people under mar- 
tial law. Having decided that it was impossible to cap- 
ture Kaskaskia on account of the season, he accordingly 
went into winter quarters. A small scouting party was 
sent to secure information concerning the Americans with 
instructions to capture Colonel Clark, if possible, by watch- 
ing the roads about Kaskaskia. 

The fort at Vincennes was remodeled. A large stock- 
ade was built and the ground inside covered with gravel. 
Two blockhouses were built of strong timbers with open- 
ings above the stockade enclosure for the cannon. Having 
decided to go into winter quarters, the British general dis- 
missed his Indian allies and sent all his Detroit militia 
home, retaining only about 100 men. Many of the latter 
men were dispatched with Indian war parties to watch the 
Ohio river and destroy all Americans found; others were 
sent on a mission to the southern Indians to raise them 
against the Tennessee frontier. All were instructed to be 
in readiness for the grand council at the mouth of the Ten- 
nessee, and the campaign in the spring, when Hamilton 
hoped to lead 1,000 well-armed troops against the Illinois 
posts, then sweep eastv/ard through Kentucky, and cap- 
ture Pittsburgh. 

Among the French in the Illinois Country there was none 
more popular than the wealthy trader, Francis Vigo of St. 
Louis. Vigo was a Sardinian who had come to America 
in a Spanish regiment. He now undertook a trip to Vin- 
cennes, partly no doubt on business of his own and partly 
to gain information for Clark regarding the conditions at 
that place. 

He left Kaskaskia December 18, ignorant of the fact 
that the British had retaken Vincennes, and a few days 
later was captured on the Embarrass river by one of Ham- 
ilton's scouting parties. After the Indians had relieved 
him of his horse, money and arms, and carried him to Vin- 
cennes, he was thrown into prison. For some unknown 
reason Hamilton allowed him to return home on promise 
of going directly to St. Louis. He reached Kaskaskia by 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 59 

way of St. Louis January 27, 1779, bringing the first satis- 
factory report Clark had received of conditions at Vin- 
cennes since the capture of Helm. A rumored attack on 
Kaskaskia had already caused Clark to concentrate his 
forces at that place. He now had one of three alterna- 
tives: he could abandon his conquests and return to the 
Falls; he could remain and risk being captured in the 
spring; or he could take desperate chances on capturing 
his enemy now in comfortable vdnter quarters. It is the 
imperishable glory of Clark that he chose the latter. He 
decided to risk everything in an immediate campaign 
against Hamilton. 

Volunteers were called for and a company of French 
Creoles enlisted for the expedition. No reinforcements had 
been sent him from Virginia, nor had he so much as 
heard from Governor Henry for almost a year. The fu- 
ture of the Northwest was, fortunately, in the hands of 
no common soldier. Genius does not ask for, nor wait 
on, authority. The weather was damp and murky, the 
flooded streams covered the level prairies. The travelers 
sank ankle-deep in the sodden leaves of the forest or the 
grass of the prairie; but fortunately the weather was 
not cold. 

§ 14 The Last Capture of Vincennes 

Colonel Clark was at Prairie Du Rocher when the 
rumor reached him that the British were already in Illinois. 
Leaving the ballroom, where he was being entertained, at 
midnight and sending a horseman to Cahokia, sixty miles 
away, to summon Bowman and his troops, he left imme- 
diately for Kaskaskia, arriving there before daylight. Al- 
though Cahokia was seventy-five miles away, Bowman, 
with his soldiers, joined his commander the following even- 
ing. Fort Gage was put in readiness for a siege. As soon 
as Vigo arrived with information that the British had re- 
tired to winter quarters, Clark began to organize his ex- 
pedition. The French freely enlisted for the attack and 
means for equipment were found by the aid of Colonel Vigo. 



60 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

A large rowboat, capable of carrying fifty men and half 
a dozen small cannon, was equipped and placed under the 
command of John Rogers, a cousin of Colonel Clark. This 
boat was to drop down to the mouth of the Ohio and ascend 
that stream and the Wabash to within a few miles of 
Vincennes, where it should await the troops marching over- 
land. 

The energy and determination of Clark quickly rekin- 
dled the enthusiasm of all around him. French and Ameri- 
cans alike entered heartily into the campaign against Vin- 
cennes. Clark cliose a small band of men, one hundred and 
thirty of the best, and, escorted by the Creole population, 
the girls especially joining in the parade and the priest 
adding his blessing, set out on the difficult march overland. 
As soon as they were out of town, strict discipline was en- 
forced for a few days. Then the long march of 240 miles 
began in hard earnest. As was customary with Clark, he 
required his men to take as little baggage as circumstances 
would permit. There was no real hurry and Clark made 
the mistake, almost fatal, of reaching the Wabash before 
his gunboat, the "Willing," could reach its destination. As 
soon as the little army got clear of the settlements, disci- 
pline was relaxed and for a week there was more the ap- 
pearance of a hunting party than of serious war. 

The troops left Kaskaskia February 7, and in ten days 
reached the Embarrass, near where Lawrenceville, Illinois, 
now stands. They found this river impassable and, turning 
to the right, struck the Wabash eight or ten miles below 
Vincennes. The commander of the "Willing" found the 
Wabash at flood and the main current, which he had to 
follow on account of the timber, very swift. It was thus 
impossible to get to the appointed rendezvous on time. In 
the meantime, Clark's army was reduced to the point of 
despair. The bottom lands were drowned and there were 
no boats. While the men were making dugouts, prepara- 
tory to crossing the river, some Frenchmen from Vin- 
cennes, presumably duck-hunters, were captured — or very 
probably they were Clark's friends. With the canoes thus 
captured and the dugouts they had built, the men crossed 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 61 

over to the east side of the Wabash. This was on Febru- 
ary 22. Except for one deer the army had had no pro- 
visions for three days. The horses had either been killed 
or left on the Illinois side of the Wabash. In vain did Colo- 
nel Clark send down the river to learn tidings of his boat. 
He had hoped to reach Vincennes by a half-day's march 
after crossing the Wabash; but now an endless waste of 
water was all his eyes could see, with here and there at 
intervals of three or four miles the crests of hills rising 
above the flood. The Frenchmen discouraged Clark's men 
by saying that it was utterly impossible to get to Vin- 
cennes without boats. Something, however, had to be done, 
so the little army set out in Indian file, Clark in the van, 
Bowman in the rear, and after wading three miles in water 
waist deep, reached a few acres of dry land and camped 
for the night. There was not a bite to eat. Morning 
brought only a renewal of the toilsome struggle. This day's 
march led them through a growth of underbrush almost 
covered with water which made the wading doubly difficult. 
Finally they came to a place where the water gradually 
deepened. The men in the dugouts reported it too deep to 
wade. There was no hope in return. The men gathered 
around their commander and it seemed their expedition 
was at an end. Colonel Clark hesitated only for a moment, 
then pouring out some powder in his hand, wet it, black- 
ened his face, and in desperate mockery gave the Indian 
war-whoop as he plunged into the water. His followers 
struck up a song. The water was already up to their chins, 
when some of the soldiers, perhaps Frenchmen who were 
well acquainted with the land, struck a path with their 
feet. This led them over the highest ground, thus en- 
abling them to wade to a hill on which was an old sugar 
camp. Here they found about half an acre of dry land, on 
which they camped for the night. Their courage was well- 
nigh gone. There was no food and the night was cold. 

The morning sun rose bright and clear. Instead of 
breakfast the men listened to a spirited appeal from their 
captain. Vincennes was in sight but separated from them 
by six miles of water, covered in many places by a thin 



62 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

crust of ice. Clark did not wait for parley, but when he 
had finished his harangue, drew his sword and led the way. 
The water was shoulder deep. There were no trees nor 
brush to support the weakened soldiers. Major Bowman, 
instructed to put to deatii any man who refused to march, 
with twenty Virginians, brought up the rear. The lake 
before them was the Horseshoe Plain, four miles wide, cov- 
ered with three or four feet of water. On the other side 
was a forest. Toward this they worked their way. The 
canoes and dugouts plied along the line picking up the 
weakest. Each strong man was supporting a weaker. 
Finally they reached the timber only to find the water 
deeper. A few of the staunchest were able to make this 
last short distance, where the water came to their chins. 
The others clung to trees and logs till they were picked 
up by the boats. Many, when out of the water, w^ere unable 
to stand. The leaders built fires as soon as they reached 
the island and as the others came ashore they were alter- 
nately exercised and warmed until they regained their 
strength. To add to their good fortune a canoe in charge 
of some squaws was seen and overhauled. Some buffalo 
meat, tallow, corn, and kettles to cook them in, were thus 
obtained and a light meal of broth prepared. The spirits 
of the soldiers revived with the passing of the danger. Vin- 
cennes laj^ in full view across a narrow plain. 

The lower parts of this intervening plain were covered 
with water. Some Frenchmen were out on the water shoot- 
ing ducks. A party of Clark's Creoles brought into camp 
one of these fowlers, from whom Clark learned the condi- 
tions at Vincennes. So far, the coming of the Americans 
had not been discovered. There were about 200 white men 
in Vincennes and an equal number of Indian warriors. The 
situation as it presented itself to Clark was not without dif- 
ficulty. An indiscriminate attack on the town would throw 
all its inhabitants together into an opposing force more 
than double the Americans. A surprise was risky even if 
it could be effected. It would leave those who sympathized 
with the Americans, and Clark knew they were numerous, 
in doubt as to what to do. 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 63 

Clark did the only sensible thing under the circum- 
stances. He sent a letter by the captured fowler to his 
friends in Vincennes, apprising them of his arrival and 
warning them to keep off the streets and out of the way of 
harm until he captured the fort. The tone of his letter led 
them to believe that there was no doubt of his success. 
Under these conditions it seems no one took either the 
trouble or the risk of Clark's displeasure to warn the garri- 
son. 

Clark immediately marshalled his little battalion 
and followed close upon his messenger. By the time the 
curious Creoles had gathered at the edge of the town to see 
if the report was really true, Clark was marching into the 
town. The attacking column formed in two divisions. One 
under Bo^\^nan marched direct to Fort Sackvilie and shut 
up the garrison. The other, under Clark himself, took pos- 
session of the town. The Frenchmen, referred to by Clark 
as prisoners, acted as guides and every movement was car- 
ried out with precision. 

Fort Sackvilie, it is thought, stood near the river bank 
between the present Vigo and Barnet Streets, facing St. 
Xavier Church, which stood in what is now Church Street. 
The fort was in a good state of defense except for a garri- 
son. The French militia, on whom Hamilton had largely 
depended, now deserted him. 

The first division of the Americans took up a position in 
front of the main gate of the fort, where, under cover of 
darkness, they hastily threw up a barricade. The other 
Americans took up their positions cautiously around the 
fort and a desultory fire was kept up on the blockhouses 
throughout the night. After daw^n the battle opened in 
good earnest. The accurate fire of the frontiersmen, many 
of whom were only fifty yards from the fort, prevented the 
British from manning their guns, and after six or eight 
men were hit they gave it up entirely. The French militia 
now joined the Americans boldly. The Piankeshaw chief 
also offered to aid Clark with 200 warriors but the offer 
was courteously declined, although Clark availed himself 
C(f the chief's counsel during the night. About nine o'clock 



64 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

in the morning, February 24, Clark sent in a demand for 
surrender. While this flag of truce was passing, Clark's 
men ate breakfast, which was kindly furnished them by the 
women of Vincennes. Hamilton promptly refused the de- 
mand for an unconditional surrender. 

In the afternoon the courage of the British began to 
fail. The superior marksmanship of the back-woodsmen 
was telling on the garrison. Hamilton had only about sixty 
trusty British regulars, the rest being Detroit volunteers. 
Of the regulars, eight or ten were already killed or wound- 
ed. With his garrison half mutinous and an assault on 
the works imminent, Hamilton sent out a flag to ask for 
terms. A conference followed at the church. While this 
was being held, some Indians, who had been captured a few 
hours before, were led down the street to the river bank 
in front of the fort gate, tomahawked, and their bodies 
thrown into the river. The miserable wretches had been 
taken red-handed as they returned from a scalping raid to 
Kentucky. Their brutal butchery by Clark's men is not to 
be condoned, but the sight of it completely unnerved Ham- 
ilton, and terms of surrender were quickly arranged. Thus 
culminated one of the romantic exploits of the Revolution. 
Its results have been more far-reaching than those of any 
other achievement of that war save the achievement of In- 
dependence itself. 

Historians have not failed to point out the great ad- 
vantage which the capture of Vincennes gave to our peace 
commissioners at the Treaty of Paris, but they have ne- 
glected to emphasize its immediate eff'ect on the Revolu- 
tionary War itself by completely breaking up the British 
campaign for 1779. The city of Savannah had just been 
stormed and a British base of operations established there. 
Agents from this place had gone among the southern In- 
dians and raised them against the back settlements. Arms 
and other supplies of war, to the value of $100,000, had 
been sent to the Cherokees, who were making their war 
camp at Chickamauga. From the north, Hamilton had 
come do^vn from Detroit, had recaptured Vincennes and 
was spending the winter there repairing the fort. He re- 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 65 

garded Clark as a mere frontier raider, who, in the pres- 
ence of an organized force, would offer about as much re- 
sistance as Helm had at Vincennes. This was his fatal 
mistake. He had sent most of his soldiers among the tribes 
to prepare for the big council of all the western Indians, 
from the Chickasaws and the Cherokees on the south to 
the Menominees and Outagamies on the north, to be held 
in the spring at the mouth of the Tennessee. With a force 
of 1,000 Indians and British, provided with brass cannon 
to batter down the stockade forts in the valley, Hamilton 
intended to sweep up the Ohio, break up the settlements of 
Kentucky, capture Pittsburg and devastate the frontiers 
of Virginia and Pennsylvania. At the same time a British 
army would advance from the south. Thus, with Howe at 
Philadelphia, they would attack Pennsylvania and Virginia 
on all sides and end the war. Virginia never did herself 
more honor than when these dangers hovered on her bord- 
ers. While one of her sons drove Howe to the seacoast at 
New York, another. Col. Isaac Shelby, gathered up a small 
army and fell upon the Cherokee camp at Chickamauga, 
destroying all their stores, killing many warriors and de- 
moralizing the tribe; a third, as has been noted, captured 
the British general, Hamilton, at Vincennes. Not only did 
the winter campaigns of Clark and Shelby save the frontier 
from Indian depredations and allow the backwoodsmen to 
fight at King's Mountain and Cowpens, but it kept open 
the western way to New Orleans, whence many of the sup- 
plies for the Virginia troops came. 

Colonel Clark learned from his captives that a detach- 
ment of Hamilton's troops was already on its way to Vin- 
cennes with a large amount of stores for the Indian council 
at the mouth of the Tennessee and for the ensuing cam- 
paign. The next day after the surrender, February 26, he 
sent fifty men in three boats up the river to intercept this 
party before it should learn the fate of the garrison at 
Vincennes. The command was given to Captain Helm, but 
most of the men were Vincennes militia under their own 
officers, Francis Bosseron and J. M. P. Legras. They ad- 
vanced rapidly for about one hundred and twenty miles, 



66 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

when the scouts announced the approach of the enemy. 
These latter were in seven boats commanded by Commis- 
sary Adhemar. They were surprised in camp at night and 
then taken without a struggle. There were forty of the 
British in seven boats and fifty of the Americans in three. 
The mails from Detroit, with dispatches to Hamilton, were 
all captured, showing that the surprise was complete. There 
was great rejoicing among the Creoles when the party re- 
turned. The captured stores were valued at $50,000. 

Clark was thinking seriously of continuing his march 
against Detroit; and, but for the prisoners with which he 
was encumbered, might have made the attempt. The pros- 
pect of success was encouraging. There were only eighty 
soldiers in the dilapidated fort at Detroit. The citizens 
prepared a public feast when they heard that Hamilton was 
captured, and they laid up stores against the time when 
Clark should make his appearance at their post. Clark 
thought it best, however, not to risk all in a desperate 
venture that was not absolutely necessary. 

On March 7 Hamilton and eighteen other British pris- 
oners were sent to Virginia and the rest of the captured 
men were either paroled or voluntarily took the oath of 
allegiance. Forty men, under Lieut. Richard Brashers, were 
left to garrison Fort Sackvilie, whose name they changed 
to Fort Patrick Henry; Captain Helm was made civil com- 
mandant of the town. With the rest of his troops. Colonel 
Clark embarked on his little fleet for Kaskaskia, March 20, 
1779. 

It is extremely unfortunate that Clark was unable to 
capture Detroit at this time. The long, bloody Indian wars 
that followed, lasting twenty-five years, are inseparably 
connected with the British occupation of that post. The 
Miami Indians might have been saved had it not been for 
British interference. As it was, their minds were poisoned 
against the Americans so much that they fought until 
they were ruined.^ 

3 The best source for the det;iils of Clark's CiUnpiiiiin is the Gvorfle 
Rogers Clark Papers, imblished. 1912, by the Illinois Stnte Historical 
Library ; James Alton James, president of Northwestern University, 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 67 

§ 15 Civil Government Under Virginia 

An account of Clark's victory at Kaskaskia reached 
Virginia in October, 1778. On the recommendation of the 
governor all the lands northwest of the Ohio were organ- 
ized as the county of Illinois. John Todd, Jr., was chosen 
county lieutenant to establish the authority of Virginia in 
the new conquest. He reached Kaskaskia in May, 1779, 
soon after Clark returned from his campaign against Vin- 
cennes. His instructions required him to show every pos- 
sible respect to the French and cultivate the good vdll of 
the Indians. He had no authority either to make grants 
of land to settlers or purchase it from Indians. He was to 
give the people all the self-government compatible with 
military occupation and their exposed position. 

Soon after his arrival, perhaps in June, he ordered an 
election. The details of this early election would be inter- 
esting but we do not have them. In June, either by this 
election or by appointment, a civil and criminal court was 
constituted at Vincennes. Col. J. M. P. Legras and Maj. 
Francis Bosseron were the leading citizens at Vincennes. 
The former became commandant of the post, while the lat- 
ter, who vv^as the wealthiest of the inhabitants, ruled the 
council or court, as it was called. The chief activity of the 
commandant as vv^ell as the court was to make grants of 
land, especially to the new settlers, many of whom followed 
in Clark's wake. This power was not conferred on court 
or commandant, as has been stated, and its use soon led to 
trouble. Lieutenant Todd soon returned to Virginia on 
business of the new government, leaving the French to 
carry on their government to their own liking. There is 
no evidence that he was ever in Vincennes.^ 

editor. In this volume are all the papers relating to Clark's campaign. 
Good accounts are by William H. English, The Conquest of the Country 
Northicest of the River Ohio; by Theodore Roosevelt, The Wi7ini)ig of 
the West; Dunn, IncUamv; and numerous authors of lesser note. Butler, 
Histonj of Kentucky, and Marshall. History of Kentucky, both wrote 
while many of Clark's soldiers were living. Roosevelt used some tra- 
dition.al evidence in his account. 

4 The Record Book and I'apers of John Todd are given in number 
thirty-five, Fergus IJistorical Series, edited by Edwin G. iNIason, 1S90. 



68 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Left without the support of the Virginians, the govern- 
ment at the French posts rapidly melted away into anar- 
chy. There was no power to regulate the Indian trade 
and the visits of the Indians were the occasions for drunken 
debauchery and robbery. The usual results followed. The 
outraged Indians meted out their vengeance to the exposed 
farmers. Murders were a daily occurrence. The orderly 
class of people in the villages undertook to drive the lawless 
traders away and in the struggle organized government dis- 
appeared. The trade with Canada was entirely ruined by 
Clark's success and that with New Orleans soon ceased be- 
cause the Indians resorted more and more to Detroit, where 
they were better treated by the British. 

The Virginians flooded the Illinois and Wabash settle- 
ments with paper money which soon depreciated and became 
worthless. "^ Several of the best friends of the conquerors 
were financially broken by accepting this in payment for 
their property. The priests strove to set a barrier to the 
flood of vice. The letters of Father Gibault to his bishop at 
Quebec give us a terrible picture for Vincennes. According 
to him the condition of the little village was much more 
vicious and lawless than the Miami towns higher up on the 
Wabash. The Virginia legislature soon realized its own in- 
ability to garrison and govern the distant settlements and 
turned the whole conquest over to the national government, 
which did not find itself able to furnish a stable administra- 
tion for the next ten years. During this time the soil of 
Indiana was devoted to violence and savage wars. 

Before leaving this chapter of western history the gen- 
erous recognition of the services of her soldiers by Virginia 
must be noted. A beautiful and costly sword, engraved 
appropriately, was voted the victorious Colonel Clark. Be- 
sides this and the formal thanks of the legislature, a tract 
of land was donated to the little army. The land was se- 
lected by Clark, and the other officers appointed for that 
purpose, on the north bank of the Ohio river just above the 

5 See letter of J. M. P. Legras in the Todd Papers, Fergus His- 
torical Scries, No. 33, p. 198. The French farmers had sold all their 
produce to Clark for these worthless bills. 



THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA 69 

Falls. This tract of 150,000 acres, lying in Clark, Scott and 
Floyd counties, is known as "Clark's Grant," or the "Illinois 
Grant." It was the first land surveyed in the State and, 
with the Vincennes tract, forms the only exception to the 
general survey in the State. It was divided into lots of 
500 acres each. A town site of 1,000 acres was set aside by 
the State of Virginia and named Clarksville. Here the gal- 
lant general and many of his men made their home, and 
the cities they founded here at the Falls, Louisville, Clarks- 
ville, Jeffersonville, are their appropriate monuments.*^ 

c There is a vast amount of literature on the subject of Clark's con- 
quest, but by far the best is the monograph written by William Hayden 
English, Conquest of the Country Northwest of the River Ohio, 1S96. 
There is a good sympathetic account in The Witimng of the West, by 
Theodore Roosevelt. The documents are all given in the George Rogers 
Clark Papers, edited by James Alton James. 1912, which is the final 
authority on this period. 



(6) 



CHAPTER IV 
closing campaigns of the revolution, 1780-1783 

§ 16 Indians of Indiana 

A history of the Indian inhabitants of Indiana can 
scarcely be kept in geographical bounds, since the Indians 
were nomadic in their habits. All the tribes, which, at any 
time, had their homes on the soil of the State or hunted in 
its forests, belonged to the Algonquin stock; unless we ex- 
cept the Mingoes, who were a branch of the Iroquois and 
had homes for a time in Ohio. It is difficult to form an 
adequate notion of these primitive peoples. They left no 
records, and the untamed Indians seem to have been a puz- 
zle to the first whites who visited them. Usually morose, 
calm and cold, they would at times break out into expres- 
sions of tempestuous wrath or grief. Usually they were 
masters of their feelings, so that they could withstand the 
severest trials of cold and hunger without a murmur, or, 
tied to the post of torture, could sing their death-song like 
martyrs. But at times, such as the death of a chief, or the 
destruction of their village, they would moan and sob like 
children. 

Their thoughts were primarily of war and the chase. 
Their senses were keen but their reason rudimentary. They 
believed in sorcery and witchcraft. Spirits, friendly and 
unfriendly, animated everything around them. Powerful 
giants contended with the forest and dashed to the ground 
the stalwart oaks. The frost king came down from the 
north and blew his breath on the grass and trees and they 
died. He laid his icy hands on the lakes and rivers and 
forthwith they were still in death. The shaggy bear sought 
shelter in the hollow trees ; the deer and bison fled from the 
prairies beyond the reach of the Indian arrow. The pike 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 71 

and trout, at the frost king's approach, withdrew to the 
deepest pools. The tribes then divided up into small parties 
who pitched their bark tents in the shelter of some protect- 
ing pines. They were fortunate if all escaped death by 
cold and hunger through the long winter. 

Spring brought its bounties of fish, berries and game. 
The sufferings of the winter were forgotten in the balmy 
sunshine. But the Indians learned little by experience. 
Their squaws prepared the fields and planted the corn, 
beans and pumpkins. In the harvest time they lived care- 
free, only to meet the coming winter as unprepared as be- 
fore. Nature was too much for their simple thought and 
the work of natural forces seemed to them the work of 
spirits. Their reverent, childlike minds were lost in the 
confusion. 

No Indians made homes in the hunting grounds of Ken- 
tucky. It was the border-land of the Cherokees, Miamis 
and Iroquois. The Miamis, who visited it oftenest, did not 
dare to take their squaws and papooses there for fear of 
the hostile Cherokees, whose homes were in the mountain 
valleys of Tennessee. Likewise they did not make the up- 
per Ohio Valley their home for fear of the predatory Iro- 
quois. But around the western end of Lake Erie, in the 
valley of the Maumee, on the Wabash and its branches, the 
Mississinewa, the Eel and the Tippecanoe, on the Elkhart, 
and the St. Joseph, was a numerous population. The 
strength of these combined tribes, the Wyandots, Mingoes, 
Delawares, Shawnees, Miamis, Munsees, Pottawattomies, 
Kickapoos, Weas, Piankeshaws, and the various bands of 
Lake Indians, that sometimes visited the northern bound- 
aries of Indiana, is variously estimated at from 5,000 to 
25,000 warriors. Stretched in a chain of towns from Lake 
Erie to the lower Ohio they formed an impassable barrier 
to the further progress of western settlement. 

Under their system of confederation it was next to im- 
possible for any leader to weld the tribesmen into an army. 
There was no bond uniting the tribes, other than a feeling 
of kinship. Though open war never happened between 
whole tribes, such as was carried on between Iroquois and 



72 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Hurons in the earlier days, there were bickerings and petty 
quarrels, ending in murder and consequent reprisals, going 
on all the time. Inter-tribal quarrels were liable to blaze 
out at any time and break up a large Indian army. The 
constant encouragement of the English at Detroit also 
helped to hold the tribes more firmly together than was 
customary. Likewise the steady pressure of the white set- 
tlers threw the tribes back upon each other, making con- 
certed opposition to a mutual enemy easier. The soil of 
Kentucky, Ohio and Indiana was the last great battle- 
ground of the natives with the settlers. There the rem- 
nants of the broken tribes rallied around the native Miamis. 
They never retreated from this stronghold. When the wars 
were over, they were so completely conquered they never 
again united in a war against the whites. It will give a 
clearer idea of this Indian people to sketch briefly, in re- 
view, the history of each separate tribe.^ 

In the early days the Hurons, of whom the Wyandots 
are the descendants, occupied the basin of the Great Lakes 
and the St. Lawrence Valley down to Quebec. In an earlier 
paragraph the attempt of the French to civilize and reor- 
ganize this tribe has been noticed. The national enemies 
of the Hurons were the Iroquois. In a long v/ar, said by 
Huron tradition to have been carried on through seventy 
summers, the Iroquois drove the Hurons back on the Otta- 
was and Chippewas, whose combined strength turned the 
tide of battle ; so that the Iroquois in turn were saved only 
by the interposition of the French. The fact seems to be 
that the Hurons were so nearly destroyed that the wreck of 
the proud tribe sought refuge under the guns of Detroit. 

After the destruction of the Iroquois in 1778-9 the 
Wyandots established their tribal village on Sandusky river 
in northern Ohio. They had profited by their ancient rela- 
tions with the French and far surpassed their neighbors in 

1 The best sources for the historj- of the northwestern Indians are, 
Ahorigincs of the Ohio Valley, by William Henry Harrison ; The Jesuit 
Relations; Thwnites, Early Western Travels; The Indian Tribes of the 
United States, Henry R. Schoolcraft ; and The French in Arneriea, Fran- 
cis Parkman. There is a vast literature on the subject, most of which 
is partisan. For illustrations of Indian life see Catlin. 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 73 

civilization. They lived in well-constructed log dwellings 
and carried on considerable agriculture. They numbered 
at this time near 450 warriors. From this new home they 
joined with other Indians in the long border warfare car- 
ried on during and after the Revolution. They joined in 
the various treaties that mark the stages of that struggle, 
and, when finally forced to cede their last lands to the 
United States they passed with their kindred tribes to the 
valley of the Kansas. 

The Wyandots had the reputation of being the bravest 
as well as the most humane warriors on the frontier. They 
rarely punished their captives ; but, on the contrary, at once 
adopted most of them into their families. So many captives 
were adopted that the character of the tribe was materially 
changed. Many traditions lingered with the warriors and 
chieftains of this nation. One tradition is that in the old 
days of the tribe's glory, a famous chief, wishing to know 
how many warriors he had, commanded that each, as they 
filed past him, should drop into a wooden bowl, which the 
chief held, a single grain of corn. Although the bowl held 
over half a bushel, the grains had filled it before all the 
warriors were past. 

Like the Wyandots, the Mingo Indians were a tribal 
remnant. They were the descendants of the haughty Iro- 
quois. In their days of power they had fought their ene- 
mies victoriously on the shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, 
in the valley of the Connecticut, on the banks of the Missis- 
sippi, along the rocky coasts of Lake Superior and among 
the pine barrens of the Carolinas. In all those wide reaches 
no Indians lived that did not acknowledge the power of 
these warriors. But at the close of the Revolution the 
broken tribes were refugees in the land of their ancestral 
enemies. The Mingo Villages were in northern Ohio and 
few, if any, ever made their homes in what is now Indiana, 
though in war and chase they joined with the Miamis and 
ranged our forests and streams. 

Like the latter nations, the Delawares also were a fugi- 
tive people. Their fathers sleep on the beautiful Susque- 
hanna, around the Chesapeake, and on the numerous rivers 



74 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

and bays of Virginia. They were Delawares who captured 
John Smith; and so were those who treated with Wilham 
Penn. Powhatan and Pocahontas were of their royal blood. 
Before the terrible Iroquois and the encroachment of the 
white settlers they had been forced gradually westward. 
Count Zinzendorf, Heckewelder and David Zeisler, the 
Moravian missionaries, had worked among them. 

The homeless tribes settled on the Muskingum and 
Beaver creek in Ohio about 1760. There they established 
their "Gnadenhiitten" or Tents of Peace. They were a 
dirty, squalid people about their villages. Lazy warriors 
basked in the sun or smoked in indolence while their squaws 
tended the small gardens or did other work. Their numer- 
ous towns were scattered far up this valley. They could 
muster near 600 warriors. They mingled on terms of equal- 
ity and friendship with the Shawnees and took an honor- 
able part in every contest for their new homes from Brad- 
dock's Defeat to the Battle of the Thames. After the War 
of 1812 they were transported beyond the Missouri. Some 
of the tribesmen passed thence into Texas, where they 
served as guides or hunters along the Santa Fe Trail, vary- 
ing the occupation occasionally by robbing Mexicans, in 
which they exhibited their old time skill, for they were re- 
puted to be the best horsethieves along the border. 

The Shawnee Indians have a beautiful tradition of the 
Creation. It runs thus: The Master of life, himself an 
Indian, made the Shawnee before any other human beings. 
He gave to the Indians all the knowledge he himself pos- 
sessed. From, the various parts of the first Shawnee the 
Master made the French, English, Dutch and Americans. 
The inferior nations were made white, as a sign of their 
v»Aeakness. But later, the all-powerful Shawnees, be- 
coming corrupt, knowledge was taken from them and given 
to the despised whites. 

Of all the savages who warred on the western settlers, 
the most dreaded and despised were the treacherous, cruel, 
sneaking Shawnees. Their very name was a terror through- 
out the border. They are said to have come originally from 
the south, driven thence by the allied tribes on account of 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 75 




76 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

their cruelty. They settled on the Scioto and on Paint 
creek in Ohio. Large towns were found also at Piqua and 
on Mad river. Later they settled on the Great Miami. The 
Chillicothe Towns were also Shawnee. All told there were 
no less than sixteen villages. Under their most famous 
chiefs, Tecumseh and the Prophet, they migrated to In- 
diana. From the beginning of the French and Indian War 
in 1755 down to the end of the War of 1812, ill-tempered 
Shawnee warriors were continually harassing the Ameri- 
can frontiers. Rarely taking a leading part, it vv^as they 
who usually broke the peace by committing some murder- 
ous foray. They were near the Ohio and it is to them that 
nearly all the long list of casualties on that river are to be 
charged. In the beginning of these wars they were a 
numerous tribe. The Piqua Tov/ns alone are said to have 
numbered 4,000 souls. The last years of the struggle 
wasted them rapidly, so that when they were transported 
to their western home only about 1,800 of the large tribe 
remained. 

So far as is known the Piankeshaws had always lived 
on the Lower Wabash. They had always been on friendly 
terms with the French and when the latter welcomed the 
Virginian, the Piankeshaws did likewise. Their friend- 
ship for the Americans was most fortunate; for, had the 
two hundred warriors of Tobacco's Son been hostile, the 
conquest of Vincennes could not have been made by Colonel 
Clark. They were a branch of the Miami Confederacy. 
Their towns extended as far up as the Terre Haute and the 
Vermillion stream. They quickly melted away before the 
vices of the more highly civilized whites. Harrison later 
described them as a most woebegone people, who, after 
bartering their clothes for whiskey, would then spend their 
time in drunken debauchery as long as the whiskey lasted. 
Count Volney says the swine rolled the drunken wretches 
around in the gutter with their snouts. 

Strongest of all the northwestern Indians were the Mia- 
mis. The nation or confederacy was made up of at least 
four tribes. The Twightwees lived in the valley around the 
junction of the rivers St. Mary and St. Joseph. Their prin- 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 77 

cipal village, Kekionga, was on the site of Fort Wayne. 
Another large village, over on Eel river, was called the Eel 
River Miamis. Other villages were on the Mississinewa 
and on the headwaters of White river. 

Down the Wabash farther was the Wea town, Ouiatanon, 
claimed by the Weas as the ancient home of their fore- 
fathers. Their squaws and children cultivated wide fields 
on the Wea Plains below Lafayette. The Shockeys, who 
dwelt on the Vermillion river and the prairie west of the 
Wabash, were also reported pure Miamis. Besides these, 
there were the Pottawattomies, whose principal villages 
were on the Tippecanoe and the many beautiful lakes tribu- 
tary to it, and on the Kankakee river and the St. Joseph 
of Lake Michigan. This was a warlike tribe when aroused, 
but not so irritable as the Shawnees or Delawares. The 
Kickapoos were an allied, if not a kindred, tribe living on 
the prairies northwest of Lafayette. Bands of Chippewas 
and Ottav/as frequently dwelt on the Yellow and Kankakee 
rivers in friendly relation with the Miamis. 

All these tribes, together with fugitive bands of Shaw- 
nees, Delawares and other eastern Indians falling back 
before the white settlers, made an Indian population on the 
Wabash of at least 5,000 warriors. Under their great chief, 
Little Turtle, they fought with a desperate courage un- 
equaled in Indian warfare. 

Their traditions taught them that the Wabash was their 
sacred river. Little Turtle, at the treaty of Greenville, said 
it was well known that his forefather kindled the first fires 
at Detroit; from thence he ran his line to the Scioto, to its 
mouth, and thence down the Ohio to the Wabash ; from the 
mouth of the Wabash to Chicago on Lake Michigan. They 
have no tradition of a migration. The earliest French ex- 
plorers found them on the Wabash and there the spirit of 
the tribe remains. A few hundreds of their children were 
carried away beyond the Mississippi, but, more nearly than 
any others, they mingled with the whites and their blood 
and spirit still animate many inhabitants of Indiana. More 
humane treatment would have subdued their haughty pride 
and converted the whole tribe into valuable citizens ; but at 



78 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the close of the eighteenth century they were a savage folk 
who massacred women and children, drank the blood of 
their victims, and made merry as they burned their captives 
at the stake. More white men have been tortured at old 
Kekionga than at any other place in the state. 

§ 17 Last Stage of the Revolutionary War in the West 

After the capture of Colonel Hamilton the British 
changed their plans in the west. Previous to that event it 
had been the custom for England to conduct the war with 
comparatively strong bodies of regular troops, aided by 
such bands of Indians as could be had. The Indians were 
armed and provisioned by the British but the war was 
waged by British troops commanded by British officers. 

After the fall of Vincennes a Tory Knickerbocker named 
Arent DePeyster, took command at Detroit. As with Ham- 
ilton and Rocheblave, the policy of this brutal partisan was 
to rouse the Indians to war, supply them with arms and 
provisions and place them in charge of white officers. This 
defensive policy had for its object the terrorization of the 
frontier. The British general hoped thus to prevent the 
Americans from making any effort at capturing Detroit. 
The Indians were led to believe that they could drive the 
settlers from Kentucky. 

Colonel Clark never regarded his work of conquest as 
finished. Detroit was his objective, and he had been keen 
enough from the first to recognize that fort as the source 
of all the western depredations. Jefferson, who succeeded 
Patrick Henry as governor of Virginia, was in accord with 
Clark's plan and did what he could to aid him. But the 
Indians north of the Ohio were becoming more hostile, and 
all the men on the border were needed to repel their fre- 
quent incursions. The traitor Arnold having invaded Vir- 
ginia in 1781, that State could hardly spare a man, nor was 
it afterward free of hostile armies till the war was ended. 
Historians have blamed the Virginia government for not 
supporting Clark ; but such censure is nonsense. He would, 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 79 

indeed, be a far-sighted governor who would send his army 
fifteen hundred miles through the forest on a foreign con- 
quest when his own capital was in the possession of the 
enemy and hostile armies devastating the homes of his 
people. 

Clark did, later, recruit some reinforcements in Penn- 
sylvania and was enabled to garrison Kaskaskia, Cahokia, 
and Vincennes. The Indians around these forts were com- 
pletely overawed. No American was more feared by the 
Indians than Clark. A small band of Delawares who had 
established themselves in the thickets near the mouth of 
White river continued to annoy the white settlers after 
they had made peace. Clark sent his rangers against them 
with instructions to destroy them. In vain the hapless 
Delawares sued for peace. The rangers tracked them down, 
sparing only the women and children. The other nearby 
tribes were treated so fearlessly and justly by Clark that 
they never afterward opposed him. It was decided to make 
the Falls the base of military operations in the west, and 
thither Clark repaired in the autumn of 1779. He was 
made a brigadier general and placed in command of all the 
western militia. His position here gave a sense of security 
to the frontier, and thousands of settlers poured into Ken- 
tucky, many even continuing on to the Wabash and Illinois 
Countries. 

While Clark was busy on the lower Ohio the British 
were directing war parties against eastern Kentucky and 
western Virginia. In order to check these John Bowman, 
the county lieutenant of Kentucky, collected 160 Kentuck- 
ians in May, 1779, and surprised the Indians in the Chilli- 
cothe Towns. The Indian town was burned but the Indians, 
regaining their courage, rallied in and around a block- 
house that had been defended against the fire and drove 
the Kentuckians away. The discomfited whites retreated 
slowly. The Indians had the best of the attack but the loss 
of their town and the show of such force was a great 
shock to them. The Kentuckians had eight or ten men 
killed and two wounded and the Indians lost an equal num- 
ber. The Kentuckians were much chagrined over their de- 



80 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

feat, but, judged by its results, it was most fortunate. The 
partisan captain, Henry Bird, was at one of the Mingo 
towns nearby, where he had succeeded in raising and arm- 
ing a formidable war party to attack the settlement. When 
news of the assault of Bowman reached them, his Indians 
fled in a panic and the expedition broke up. But Bird was 
not to be baffled. 

On June 22, 1780, there appeared before Ruddle's Sta- 
tion a small stockade on the south fork of Licking, in the 
center almost of the wilderness of Kentucky, an army of 
Canadians and Indians numbering over 700 Indians and 
near 200 rangers, flying the English flag and supported by 
artillery. Such a sight had not' been seen in Kentucky and 
w^e can hardly blame the little station for surrendering at 
discretion. This army had been raised by DePeyster and 
was in command of Captain Bird. 

Henry Bird was then a captain in the Eighth or King's 
Regiment of regulars. With him on this expedition went 
the three Girty Brothers, loyalists of Pittsburg, and Cap- 
tain McKee, the royal Indian agent. DePeyster had sent a 
strong body of Indians down the Wabash to talce Vincennes 
and join Bird in an attack on Clark at the Falls. Bird had 
been ordered to attack Clark, but when he reached the 
Ohio river his Indian chiefs forced him to attack the smaller 
stations. They had a wholesome dread of Clark. 

It was said that this was a part of the magnificent army 
of 1,500 Indians summoned to co-operate with Plamilton 
the year before. Detroit had been a beehive of industry 
during the preceding ^vinter. The commander at Quebec 
complained of the enormous amount of supplies and espe- 
cially of the whiskey consumed. Forgetful of his inten- 
tion, the tory commander having taken the little posts. 
Ruddles and Martins, on the Licking, fled precipitately to 
Canada, abandoning his guns at the Indian towns in Ohio 
and killing most of his prisoners, of whom he took nearly 
300. 

In the early months of 1780 General Clark was down 
at the mouth of the Ohio, where he established Fort Jeffer- 
son to protect the commerce with the Spanish on the Missis- 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 81 

sippi, and also to strengthen his claim to the whole east 
bank of that river. In May, with all the troops he could 
spare, he had returned through the forest to the settlements 
at Harrodsburg, Kentucky. The overwhelming force of the 
Indian attack had spread consternation among the settlers 
and many were tempted to return east of the mountains. 
Clark sent a guard to the Crab Orchard to intercept all 
those who attempted to leave by the Wilderness Road. Then 
closing the land office at Harrodsburg he drafted an army 
to go against the Indians. 

These men v/ere to meet at the mouth of the Licking, 
opposite Cincinnati. Capt. Benjamin Logan was second 
in command and looked after the men drafted, while Clark 
proceeded to Louisville and led his men from that garrison. 
The latter went up the river in light boats, while the horse- 
men rode as near the bank as possible. The settlers turned 
out almost to a man, the riflemen floating down the Licking 
on rafts or in canoes. There was little in the way of pro- 
visions, every man carrying his own supply. On August 2 
Clark ferried his men across the Ohio and plunged into the 
wilderness of Ohio. Old Chillicothe lay full sixty miles to 
the north, and thither he led his men with accustomed 
swiftness and silence. At night, to avoid surprise, the 
troops camped in a large square. Chillicothe was deserted 
when the army reached it. After burning it they hastened 
on to Piqua, on Mad river, which they reached at ten on 
the morning of August 8. Piqua, or Pickaway, was built of 
log huts in the French fashion. They stood apart from 
each other facing the stream and separated by strips of 
corniand. In the center stood a considerable block-house, 
loop-holed for muskets. Clark divided his army, sending 
half, under Logan, around to cross the stream and gain 
the rear of the villages and cut off retreat, while he himself 
led half the troops directly across and drove the Indians 
from the town. Logan failed to cross the river and the In- 
dians escaped, the 200 warriors, with their families, fleeing 
for safety. As soon as the latter had reached the cover of 
the woods, the warriors turned and faced the whites, grad- 
ually yielding, however, to superior numbers. For two 



82 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

hours this skirmish was kept up, when the Kentuckians 
returned toward the town, halting half an hour, when 
nearly there, for Logan to come up. As they returned 
Captain McAfee was killed by an Indian secreted in a tree 
top. This Indian was immediately shot, but it was soon 
found that a large body of warriors had slipped back and 
taken possession of the blockhouse. In the fighting here 
each side suffered. The Indians were finally dislodged and 
retreated under shelter of the river bank, barely escaping 
Logan, who had finally crossed the river and marched 
down. Clark lost seventeen men and the Indians about the 
same number. 

After all the Indian property was destroyed. Captain 
Logan was sent to attack a neighboring village, twenty 
miles away, which he destroyed, together with a store be- 
longing to British and French traders. The army then 
hastened home, having spent only twenty-five days on the 
campaign.2 

It was generally believed throughout the west that the 
French at Detroit were as friendly toward the Americans 
as those of the Illinois Country had been. The Americans 
felt that if a sufficient force could be quickly and quietly 
marched through the Indian country without rousing them 
the fort could be taken. There was at this time a French- 
man in the Illinois Country named LaBalme. He had come 
to America in 1776 and had served as inspector general of 
cavalry in the Continental Army. He was chosen for the 
attempt on Detroit because it was thought he would have 
great influence with his countrymen at Detroit and in Illi- 
nois. Ambitious to duplicate the achievements of Clark, 
he raised a company of seventy or eighty Creoles in Illinois 
and on the Wabash in the fall of 1780 and hastened up the 
Wabash. The Indians, cowed by punishment so recently 
inflicted by Clark, no doubt would not have interfered with 

2 The doeuuieutary iiistory of these Indian campaigns is in the 
George Rogers Clark Papers. This should be supplemented by Jeffer- 
son's letters, given in his works, by TIenn/s Life of Henry; and by But- 
terfield's History of the Girtys. The Haldiraand Papers contain the 
documents on the British side. Butler's History of Kcntiickg is the 
best of the old books on this period. 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 83 

LaBalme's march had he proceeded directly to his work. 
But his control over the Creoles, many of whom were traders 
and bush rangers, was slight and the stores of the British 
traders at the site of Fort Wayne tempted his men to 
plunder. While engaged in plundering, a large force of 
Indians under Little Turtle fell upon the camp of the in- 
vaders by night, in early November, and killed about half 
the party, including the captain, and scattered the rest to 
the woods. Had LaBalme marched directly, without mo- 
lesting the traders on whom the Indians depended for sup- 
plies, his chances were favorable for success.^ 

Early in the war Virginians had opened up commercial 
connections with the Spanish at New Orleans. Communi- 
cations had been kept open and nearly all the ammunition 
used in the western campaign had come from Spanish mer- 
chants. An agent of Virginia stationed at New Orleans 
furnished Clark with money for his Illinois garrisons. 
When Clark was in Illinois he had also exchanged civilities 
with the Spanish commanders at St. Louis and St. Gene- 
vieve. But he soon came to distrust them, believing that 
they would be pleased to see the British regain the Illi- 
nois so that they might in turn drive the British out 
and thus hold the whole western country for Spain at the 
close of the war, which all saw was fast approaching. With 
this design of the Spaniards the French seemed in full sym- 
pathy. It was their hope to limit the Americans to the 
country east of the crest of the mountains. If not held for 
the Spanish Crown the Northwest at least would serve as a 
makeweight in the treaty for the cession of Gibraltar. 

A Spanish general named Bernardi de Galvez, with a 
force of Creoles, both French and Spaniards, captured the 
posts on the middle river — Baton Rouge and Natchez — and 
then marched on Mobile and Pensacola. The commander 
of St. Louis joined in the work early in 1781. On January 
2 Don Pierro, the commandant, led a party of 100 nonde- 
script Spaniards, Indians and French Creoles from St. Louis 
against the post of St. Joseph on the St. Joseph river of 
Lake Michigan. He met with no opposition but was afraid 

3 John Todd Papers, Fergus Historical Series, No. 33, 207, note. 



84 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

to garrison the post after he had robbed the British fur- 
traders and burned their huts. Like the plunderer he was, 
he retreated faster than he had advanced. Insignificant as 
the raid was, Spain laid claim to the whole territory north- 
west of the Ohio on the strength of it. 

Since the capture of Vincennes, Clark had kept in mind 
his intention to take Detroit. At a council of war, held at 
the Falls in 1779, he had discussed it with his fellow offi- 
cers, but the establishment of Fort Jefferson, the invasion 
by Bird, and the expedition against the Piqua Town, had 
occupied him for over a year. He hastened to Virginia, 
as soon as he could leave Kentucky, to perfect his arrange- 
ments and raise troops. He found Virginia in great dis- 
tress over the invasion of Arnold, and at once joined the 
army to drive out the traitor. 

Jefferson had already expressed his approval of the 
plan to capture Detroit and had enlisted the co-operation 
of Washington, who directed Col. Daniel Brodhead, com- 
manding at Fort Pitt, to furnish Clark with supplies and a 
battalion of regular troops. Everything seemed in a good 
way till he began to recruit soldiers. It was then learned 
that everybody was worn out with the long war. From 
Frederick, Berkeley and Hampshire counties the lieuten- 
ants reported troops unable to move on account of lack of 
supplies. In some cases there was open mutiny. Colonel 
Brodhead refused the detachment of regulars. Clark had 
hoped to leave Pittsburg by June 15, but he had to depart 
much later with only 400 men. By August 4 he was at 
Wheeling, having given up all hope of a campaign against 
Detroit, though he still had hopes of punishing the Indians. 

In connection with this attempt on Detroit there oc- 
curred the greatest disaster sustained in the West during 
the war. Col. Archibald Lochry raised 107 men in West- 
moreland county, Pennsylvania, and started with them to 
join Clark. They reached Wheeling August 8. Clark had 
waited for them five days, but his men growing restless 
and deserting, he had gone on leaving Lochry and his band 
to follow. Twenty or thirty miles below, Clark waited 
again, and again had to go and leave them behind. His 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 85 

troops were deserting so fast he did not dare wait any 
longer. Lochry followed, but, despairing of overtaking 
Clark with his whole force, he sent Lieutenant Shannon 
with seven men ahead to let Clark know he was coming. 

These seven men were taken by the Indians and with 
them the letter of Lochry to Clark, detailing the condition 
and number of aU. Clark's forces, including those under 
Lochry. 

There was great excitement, not only at Detroit but 
among the savages of Ohio, when it was learned Clark 
was gathering an army. DePeyster hastily gathered to- 
gether the frightened Indians and sent them, together with 
one hundred of Butler's rangers under partisan command- 
ers, to ward off the intended blow against Detroit. It was 
a part of this Indian army led by the Iroquois, Joseph 
Brant, and the Pittsburg refugee. George Girty, that cap- 
tured Lieutenant Shannon and immediately laid an ambus- 
cade for Lochry's company. A spot was selected about 
eleven miles below the mouth of the big Miami where 
Lochry creek joins the Ohio. There the Ohio was very 
narrow. A bar at low water ran almost across the river. 
Unfortunately the Americans decided to land on this bar 
for some purpose or other, thus walking directly into the 
ambuscade. The whole party was killed or captured. Some 
of the prisoners were killed, Colonel Lochry being of this 
number, and the rest were taken to Detroit, whence sixty 
finally reached home. The Indians, joined by the other 
tribes and led by the British Indian agent, Alexander Mc- 
Kee, followed on down to within thirty miles of the Falls, 
but, although they numbered near 1,000 men, they made 
no attack. As soon as they learned that Clark had aban- 
doned all hope of an offensive campaign they separated, 
a large band of Wyandottes and Miamis under McKee and 
Brant going into Kentucky on a marauding expedition.^ 

4 For a popular aiifl fairly accurate account of the principal events 
of this period, in the history of the West, see .Tames R. Albach Annals 
of the West. Mann Butler. History of Kentucky is valuable, being 
written from first hand evidence. A detailed account of I.ochry's Defeat, 
by Charles Martindale. is published in A^ol. II. PuNications Indiana 
Historical Soricty; D. V. Culley, in Lawrenccburg Palladium, Mtxy 15, 

(7) 



86 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The year 1782 saw the last of the Revolutionary 
struggle between the English and Americans in the north- 
west, saw the most bloodshed of any year on the frontier, 
and saw the deepest gloom settle down over Kentucky. 
The agents of the British roused the Indians to frenzy by 
telling them that the Americans were preparing to drive 
them into Canada. The actions of the American troops on 
the border seemed to the Indians to confirm this. The 
year had scarcely begun when Col. David Williamson, with 
a company of Pennsylvania militia, on the track of a ma- 
rauding band of Wyandottes and Moravians, came to the 
Moravian towns on the Tuscarawas river, and, finding 
some of the bloodstained clothing of their murdered 
friends on the backs of these so-called peaceful Indians, 
they massacred every Indian they could get their hands on. 
The militia have been severely condemned for this bloody 
deed, but they did only what most men would have done 
under the circumstances. 

Hardly had this unfortunate blow blotted out the Mo- 
ravian tribe when, on June 4, Col. William Crawford ap- 
peared among the Upper Sandusky Towns. The fact that 
Crawford was killed and his regiment driven back did not 
quiet the natives. Their scouts brought reports that Gen. 
William Irvine at Fort Pitt was collecting a powerful army 
of regulars to invade the Miami country. The Indians 
gathered in great numbers at the Shawnee town of Wapa- 
tomica in central Ohio. Here also at their own urgent 
request they were joined by Capt. William Caldwell of the 
British rangers. After the usual round of inflammatory 
speeches they decided to march on Wheeling under the lead 
of Captain Caldwell. Hardly had Caldwell started when 
a report reached Detroit that Clark was preparing for a 
campaign. Such was the fear of both British and Indians 
for that leader that the expedition against Wheeling was 
recalled and the Indian agents of Detroit were sent in 
haste in all directions to call in the warriors. Shawnees, 

1830, tells the story as he had it from Patrick Hunter, one of the cap- 
tives, living in 1830 near Corydon : see also Life of JosepJi linnii. and 
Butterfield. History of the Girtys. 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 87 

Delawares, Wyandottes, Mingoes, Munceys, Ottawas, Chip- 
pewas and Miamis hastened to the rendezvous at the Piqua 
Plains. Had the hero of the Illinois led his Kentuckians 
into the Scioto country then he would have found the In- 
dians at home to receive him. Alexander McKee, the In- 
dian agent, said it was the largest force of Indians that 
had been collected in the Northwest up to that time. 
Only imminent danger could keep an Indian army together 
and when scouts from the Falls reported that the alarm 
was false this army melted away in a day. Of the 1,400 
assembled, Captain Caldwell was able to persuade only 300 
to go with him on a raid into Kentucky. It was this band 
that laid siege to Bryan's Station and a few days later, 
August 19, administered the disastrous repulse to the Ken- 
tucky militia at Blue Licks. Attacks were made about the 
same time on Rice's Fort, Fort Henry, and Wheeling, but 
the Indians had no skill in capturing fortified posts."- 

During the latter part of August Colonel De Peyster 
at Detroit was warned that peace was at hand and to stop 
hostilities. Scouts were dispatched to the rangers acting 
with the Indians. Had these been a few days earlier the 
loss at Blue Licks would have been avoided. As it was 
the Indians had roused their dreaded enemy at the Falls 
and now were left leaderless to bear his vengeance. The 
call of Clark had awakened the settlers to their old-time 
courage, and under the inspiration of his fame 1,050 set- 
tlers assembled at the mouth of the Licking opposite Cin- 
cinnati to punish the invaders. He crossed the Ohio No- 
vember 4, and in six days was among the Miami towns. 
The Indians had barely time to scatter to the woods, 
warned only by the alarm cry. A score of tribesmen were 
killed or captured and all their towns burned. Thinking 
themselves secure, the Indians had gathered here their win- 
ter's supply of corn and beans, all of which were lost. The 
blow was especially severe to the women and children. 

5 For this period there is uo better history than Consul W. Butter- 
fielfl's History of the Girtys. See also Roosevelt. Winning the West ; 
McClung, Sketches of Western Adi>enture. The best sources are the 
Haldimand Papers, Pennsylvania Archives; Heckewilder's Narrative. 



88 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

One can only pity them in their privations as they faced 
the winter without food or shelter in the inhospitable wil- 
derness. Nor should he at the same time forget the women 
and children left defenseless by the dastardly crimes of 
the warriors on the frontier. Without appearing to con- 
done the deeds of the Indians, whose very savagery is a 
sort of excuse for their unspeakable atrocity, the reader is 
reminded at every turn of this border warfare that the 
British were more guilty than the Indians. British cap- 
tains in scarlet uniform led the savage warriors in battle 
or stood by and saw them commit on their white prisoners 
cruelties not paralleled in history during the Christian era. 

The capture of Cornwallis, it was evident to all, would 
end the war between England and her former colonies and 
insure American independence. As noted above, the Brit- 
ish commanders soon after this event called in their forces. 
Provisional articles of peace were arranged on the last day 
of November, 1782, and the declaration was read at the 
head of the armies on the anniversary of the Battle of 
Lexington. 

The treaty was finally signed September 3, 1783. The 
boundary was laid down through the middle of Lake Erie, 
through Detroit river. Lake Superior, Long Lake, Lake of 
the Woods, thence due west to the Missisippi river and 
down the middle of that stream to the thirty-first degree 
of latitude. Thanks to the peace commissioners the work 
of the Virginia pioneers had not been in vain. They had 
added to the United States a territory nearly as large as 
the original colonies. Much has been said concerning what 
might have happened but for Clark's conquest. The terri- 
tory north of the Ohio at the beginning of the war was 
a part of Canada by the Quebec Act, and, had British 
armies held it to the close of the war, it would no doubt 
have remained a part of that province. It was not a de- 
fense by the Virginians of their own territory but was 
essentially a foreign conquest. Since 1783 England has 
yielded very little territory to any power, and it is all but 
certain she would never have ceded this to the United 
States. 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 89 

She did not give up a single fort on account of the 
treaty and continued to hold Oswego, Niagara, Presque 
Isle, Sandusky, Detroit, Michillimacinac and Prairie du 
Chien, in the ceded territory, plague spots to the western 
settlements. Had England delivered up these posts, the 
two nations would have been spared the expense and hu- 
miliation of a second war twenty-nine years later. 

§ 18 The Indians Become the Wards of the United 

States 

With the signing of the treaty, September 3, 1783, 
there devolved on the national government the care of the 
Indians living on the national domain. Up to this time the 
Indian problem had been one purely of frontier defense. 
But an enlightened nation could not wantonly destroy 
these simple folks. By the laws of warfare they had for- 
feited all rights to their land and almost to their lives; 
yet Congress had no idea of punishing them. It was nec- 
essaiy to adopt an Indian policy and organize a depart- 
ment of goverment to carry it out. Two of the leading 
principles incorporated in the Indian policy were the recog- 
nition of the tribal governments, and the recognition of 
the Indian ownership of the land.*^ After the long struggle 
of the pioneers was ended, as they thought, in 1783, the 
government recognized the Indian title as complete to all 
the Northwest territory. Not a settler could legally go 
into all that region. The men who went to treat with the 
tribes were given the same official title as those who went 
to treat with other foreign nations. Though ownership 
of the land was recognized in the tribes, they were not 
allowed to sell it to any other nation, nor were they allowed 
to sell it even to American settlers. If the Indians so de- 
sired, and the government lost no opportunity in creating 
such a desire, they might sell to the United States. It is 

6 This principle is stater! clearly in S Wheatoii\<i Rciwrts, 543. The 
opinion is by Chief Justice Marshall. The substance of the decision is 
given in the introduction to Vol VII, United States Statutes at Large. 
The case in question involved a sale of land by the Illinois and Pianlie- 
shaw Indians. 



90 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

to the credit of the nation that it always paid the Indians 
fair prices for their lands, more, in many cases, than it 
received from the settlers after the expense of surveying 
was paid. Those tribes that behaved themselves became 
wealthy and were fostered far more than their conduct 
deserved. 

An ordinance for the regulation of Indian Affairs 
passed the Old Congress August 7, 1786.'^ By this the 
Indian country was divided into two departments, a north- 
ern and a southern, the Ohio river being the dividing line. 
For each of these a superintendent of Indian Affairs was 
appointed. He held his office for a term of two years and 
was to reside among the Indians if possible. The northern 
superintendent had two deputies who had the care and 
custody of all goods intended for the Indians. The super- 
intendent licensed all traders and supervised them in their 
business. The traders had to be citizens of the United 
States, bear an unquestioned reputation for morality certi- 
fied to by the governor of the State in which they lived, 
and then pay $50 each annually before a license was issued. 
It was the hope of Congress to attract good men into this 
Work, but the majority of the early traders were refugee 
criminals, seeking a field where their criminal propensi- 
ties might have freer range. Traders were put under 
heavy bonds. Officers of the army and Indian agents were 
forbidden to trade with Indians on their own account. 
Finally, no white person was allowed to travel among them 
without regular passports, signed by the Indian agents. 
One wonders after reading this why the Americans were 
so indignant at the Proclamation of King George in 1763, 
after which this ordinance of 1786 was to some extent fash- 
ioned. 

The most troublesome business of the Indian commis- 
sioners was the definition of the Indian boundary. There 
were several reasons why an amicable adjustment of the 
boundary question was difficult. The national government 
was sorely in need of money and the sale of public lands 
offered the most available source of immediate revenue. 

' Amcricmi Htatc Capers: Indian Affairs, I. 14. 



CLOSING CAMPAIGN OF THE REVOLUTION 91 

Before any of the national land could be surveyed and 
sold the Indian title had to be extinguished. The settlers 
themselves were just as eager to buy as the nation was to 
sell. They w^ere not always observant of the Indian 
claims, and failing to buy the land they became squatters. 
Worst of all were the English soldiers and traders at the 
northwestern posts. The traders were anxious to push the 
Indian boundary far to the eastward and southward, so 
that the field for the fur trade might be as large as possible. 
Many of these English fur traders and English Indian 
agents were refugee loyalists and the bitterest enemies of 
the Americans. Every act of the American government 
was misinterpreted by them for the Indians. Last of all 
the Indians themselves were apprehensive. They had been 
crowded steadily westward by the whites till they had be- 
come so thoroughly suspicious of every move of the Ameri- 
cans that it was with difficulty they could be induced to 
hold a council. 



CHAPTER V 
indian wars 

§ 19 The Struggle for the Ohio River Boundary 

The first attempt to define the Indian boundary line 
was made in the summer of 1784 when Oliver Wolcott, 
Richard Butler and Arthur Lee met the Senecas, Mohav/ks, 
Onondagas, Oneidas, Tuscaroras, and Cayugas at Fort 
Stanwix, New York.^ These six Indian nations, it will be 
remembered, claimed all the land west of the Alleg'hanies. 
The commissioners acknowledged, at this time, the Ohio 
river as the boundary line. 

The Americans determined to follow this up and make 
treaties with the northwestern tribes. The latter tribes 
had never ceased harassing the western settlements. Since 
their English leaders had been recalled they had not crossed 
the Ohio in formidable bodies, but small parties of ten or 
twenty continually hovered on the border to steal, rob and 
murder. To protect the advance guards of settlement, Con- 
gress decided by resolution of June 3, 1784, to equip a 
western regiment, to be known as the First American. 
It was placed under the command of Lieut.-Col. Josiah 
Harmar with headquarters at Fort Pitt. A general Indian 
council was to be held there under the protection of this 
regiment. Accordingly messengers were sent to all the 
tribes inviting them to meet at Pittsburgh in December, 
1784. The troops and the three commissioners, Arthur 
Lee, Richard Butler, and George Rogers Clark, did not ar- 
rive at Pittsburgh till December 5, when, on account of the 

1 Treaties Between the United States ami tlic Indian Tiihes, edited 
by RichiU-d Peters, Boston, 1S4S. This is volume VII Statutes at Large 
of United Stales. All Indian Treaties from 17S9 to 1845 are printed 
in this volume. No further reference on Indian treaties will be given. 



INDIAN WARS 93 

lateness of the season, it was decided to hold the council 
nearer the Indian country. The troops were accordingly 
marched to Fort Mcintosh, thirty miles down the Ohio. 
Here January 21, 1785, a treaty was signed by the Wyan- 
dotte, Chippewa, Delaware and the Ottawa sachems. By its 
terms the boundaries were fixed as the Cuyahoga river 
from its mouth at Lake Erie to its source, thence west to 
the Big Miami and down that stream to the Ohio river 
and west with the Ohio. 

The council at Fort Mcintosh was not attended by all 
the tribes that were invited. Several were detained by the 
British Indian agents. It had been the custom during the 
later years of the Revolutionary War for the Indians to 
congregate in large numbers around the trading places of 
the English on the Maumee. This custom having been 
kept up after 1783, the traders now took advantage of it 
to persuade many of the Indians to stay away from the 
council at Fort Mcintosh. After the treaty was signed, 
they began at once to denounce it. The Indians were told 
that they would find no resting place till the Americans 
had driven them beyond the Mississippi. The Canadian 
winters of the north and the fierce Sioux of the west made 
the prospect in either case unpleasant. The Shawnees and 
Miamis were not represented at the council, but they soon 
afterward manifested a desire to make peace. 

Acting on this advice. Congress sent Richard Butler, 
George Rogers Clark and Judge Samuel Holden Parsons 
to hold a council. Capt. Walter Finney- was instructed to 
build a fort at the mouth of the Big Miami and here the 
council met in the winter of 1785-6. ^ Fearing the grow- 
ing influence of the Americans, and their councils of peace 
on the Indians, the British traders and agents had held a 
council with all the tribes of Ohio and Indiana at the Dela- 
ware town of New Coshocton. As a result of these in- 
trigues of the traders not many Indians attended at Fort 

2 A graphic description of tlois council is given in tbe We.stent 8ii7i, 
Vincennes. October 28, 1820, written by "An Old Army Oflicer" who 
wjis present at tbe council. 

SHeitmau, Historical Rcfiister Officers of ConUncniul Army, 175. 



94 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Finney, and when articles of peace were finally concluded 
January 21, 1786, only a few young Shawnee chiefs signed. 
By the terms of the treaty, the Indians were allotted lands 
lying north of a line joining the headwaters of the Big 
Miami and the Wabash. 

A small band of Cherokees living on the Scioto river 
were the firebrands that brought on the second Indian war 
on the northwest frontier, if it is worth while to distin- 
guish the different parts of one long, continuous struggle 
which began with the coming of English agents to Detroit 
and continued until the English garrisons were driven out 
of the country. The Cherokees having killed a number of 
squatters on the Scioto, were so enraged by the taste of 
blood that they crossed over into Kentucky and committed 
several murders. The Kentuckians called for protection 
on the governor of Virginia, who immediately notified 
Congress. The latter promptly ordered Col. Josiah Har- 
mar^ to station two companies at Fort Steuben, now Jeffer- 
sonville, Indiana, and to call on the Kentucky militia for 
more troops if needed. 

This military activity, and the former acts of Congress 
directing the Indian commissioners to secure large cessions 
of the Indian lands, when explained to the Indians by Eng- 
lish traders, caused the Wabash tribes to join the Shaw- 
nees and Cherokees. Their action was perhaps determined 
upon at a grand council of the tribes held at Ouiatanon late 
in the fall of 1785. A chief, sent by this council, notified 
the French at Vincennes that the Indians had decided to 
make war on the Americans, and that if the French re- 
mained at Vincennes they would also be killed. Nearly 
all the out-settlers around Vincennes were driven in or 
killed. Those who had attempted to settle on Clark's 
Grant were driven off, and travel on the Ohio and Wabash 
became extremely hazardous.^'' 

Acting on the suggestion of Congress, the Kentucky 
militia to the number of 1,500 was called out. One thou- 
sand of these under the command of Gen. George Rogers 

4 Heitman. Historical Rf'f/if<tcr Officers <if Contiiiciitdl Aniiii. 209. 

5 Ainerican State I'apers; Indian Affairs ( index ). 



INDIAN WARS 95 

Clark were directed to protect Vincennes and invade the 
Indian country up the Wabash. The troops rendezvoused 
at the Falls in the summer of 1786, and thence marched 
overland to Vincennes.'- Their supplies, in nine keel boats, 
were sent down the Ohio and up the Wabash. The army 
reached Vincennes about October 1, but, on account of low 
water in the Wabash, the supplies did not reach them until 
nine days later; when they did arrive nearly all were 
spoiled. A spirit of mutiny in the meantime manifested 
itself in the army. Whether due to inactivity, to the loss 
of the supplies and consequent low rations, or to the in- 
temperance of the commander, is not known. At any rate, 
after moving up to the Vermillion towns and finding them 
vacated, General Clark did not deem it prudent to pro- 
ceed farther with such troops and marched them back to 
Vincennes, where he disbanded them. This was the first 
of a series of mutinies that disgraced the Kentucky militia 
and twice brought disaster to the national arms." 

While his army lay at Fort Steuben waiting for sup- 
plies. General Clark ordered Col. Benjamin Logan back to 
Kentucky to raise a force and attack the Shawnees, while 
their attention was attracted by Clark to the Wabash. That 
intrepid officer found no difficulty in enlisting 500 mounted 
riflemen. With these he crossed the Ohio where Maysville 
now stands and by forced marches hurried to the Shawnee 
towns on the head branches of Mad river. A deserter 
from his army gave timely warning to the towns, enabling 
most of the Indians to escape. Colonel Logan burned eight 
towns, destroyed their corn just then ready to harvest, took 
seventy or eighty prisoners and killed twenty warriors. 
The raid, which was considered a great success, tended to 
arouse the spirit of the Kentuckians after the disgrace on 
the Wabash. 

As soon as General Clark returned to Vincennes after 
his unfortunate invasion of the Vermillion towns, he called 
a meeting of the field officers of the army, October 8, 1786, 

c Dillon. Ulstonj of IikVudui. 187: Secret Joiinxiln of Vougress, IV. 
311. 

7 Joliu K. Dillou. Historic of Iinliuna, 185. 



96 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

at which it was decided to establish a permanent garrison 
at Vincennes. It was hoped that this would prevent any 
large body of savages leaving their homes to invade Ken- 
tucky. For this garrison it was thought one field officer 
and 250 men would be sufficient. To these were to be added 
an artillery company under Capt. Valentine Dalton. Gen- 
eral Clark assumed the lead and began to enlist men, ap- 
point officers, and seize goods for the support of the garri- 
son. The lawless mob thus gathered kept up the pretense 
of a garrison until they had, under color of law, plundered 
nearly all the citizens of the village, and had openly 
robbed the stores of some resident Spaniards.^ 

It was also decided by this hastily constituted board of 
field officers to make another attempt to get the Indians 
into council. Carrying out this resolution, General Clark 
sent letters to all the tribes inviting them to meet him at 
Clarksville for a council, November 20, 1786. Quite a num- 
ber of chiefs answered this invitation, but all insisted on 
holding the council at Vincennes instead of Clarksville. Ac- 
cepting the suggestion, General Clark changed the time and 
place to Vincennes, in April, 1787. 

The work of General Clark was disavowed by Virginia, 
whereupon Congress ordered Gen. Josiah Harmar to pro- 
ceed to Vincennes and dispossess the disorderly garrison. 
In the meantime, the superintendent of Indian affairs was 
directed to meet the Indians at the appointed time. How- 
ever, after trying in vain all summer and during a large 
part of the year 1788, it was found impossible to get the 
Indians to attend. The English hold could not be broken. 

General Harmar was instructed to dispose his regiment 
so as to protect the frontier. On an average one boatload 
of settlers passed the mouth of the Muskingum river, where 
Harmar was stationed, every day. Nothing was better 
calculated to arouse the Indians than this steady stream of 
immigrants. Harmar prepared at once to visit the posts 

s Charges were preferred agaiust Clark, and the State of Virginia 
ordered an investigation. Tlie report and tlie papers are given in 
Secret Journal s of Congress: Foreign Affairs. IV, 301; Butler, History 
of Eentuckj/. ch. 9. 



INDIAN WARS 97 

to the west and establish garrisons. The Indian council 
summoned by Clark was called off, and Harmar soon after- 
wards learned that the irregular troops at Vincennes un- 
der Captain Dalton had been disbanded; so he floated leis- 
urely down the Ohio, reaching the Falls in June, 1787, on 
his way to Vincennes. Hardly had he left the upper Ohio 
when he was warned that the Delawares and Wyandottes 
were in arms. 

General Harmar's orders were to march overland from 
the Falls, but after collecting supplies and investigating 
means of transportation he decided to go by boat, and drive 
his cattle up along the bank of the Wabash from its mouth 
to Vincennes. On July 6 the advance of the little army 
under Capt. David Zeigler'-' set off down the river with a 
fleet of light boats containing three months' provisions for 
300 men. They were ordered to land at Buffalo creek and 
march overland, driving the cattle and eighteen horses. 
Harmar also wrote Col. J. M. P. Legras and Maj. Francis 
Bosseron at Vincennes apprising them of the nature of this 
expedition, and asking them to reassure the Indians. But 
some British traders operating on the Wabash a short dis- 
tance above Vincennes also heard of the approach of Har- 
mar, and, no doubt, lost little time in explaining it to their 
dusky customers. When the expedition reached Delaware 
Old Town, eight miles above the mouth of Green river, the 
troops disembarked, leaving Maj. John F. Hamtramck^'^ to 
continue by the river. The troops plunged into the wilder- 
ness and marched due north, reaching White river fifteen 
miles below its forks in five days. The first part of this 
journey of seventy miles, they reported, was through 
swampy, boggy lands, but most of the way was through fine, 
open, upland forests, interspersed with meadows or prai- 
ries. The land, they thought, would be a farmer's delight. 
In fact, one reason for wishing to march overland was to 
report on the quality of the land to Judge John Cleve 
Symmes, who was about to lose his lands in Ohio, and was 

9 Heitman. Historicol Reuister Officers of Continental Arm/if, 448. 

10 Heitmnn, Historical Register Officers of Continental Army, 207. 



98 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

contemplating locating farther down, perhaps on the Wa- 
bash. 

Vincennes they found to be a considerable village of 
400 houses, log and bark, with a population of 900 French 
and 400 Americans. Most of the Americans had come since 
Clark's invasion, a large part being militia from the lately 
disbanded army." 

Major Hamtramck arrived at Vincennes eight days later 
than Harmar, having been attacked on the way up the Wa- 
bash, and having lost a few of his men killed and some 
captured. 

After an extended visit to the Illinois posts, on which 
he retraveled the path of Colonel Clark's army eleven years 
before, Harmar returned to Vincennes to meet the Weas and 
the Upper Piankeshaws in council. Only a few of these 
small tribes attended and no negotiations looking toward 
a general peace were begun. After a liberal distribution 
of presents, including plenty of whiskey, of which Harmar 
says ''they were amazing fond," the Indians were dis- 
missed to their homes and the American commander turned 
his attention to the proper disposition of his little army in 
order to furnish the best protection for the frontier dur- 
ing the approaching winter. 

A cordon of little forts had been built from Presque Isle 
to Kaskaskia, over on the Mississippi. It was obviously 
impossible to garrison these with one regiment of about 500 
men. In place of this, General Harmar decided to leave a 
small battalion of ninety-five men under Major Hamtramck 
at Vincennes with orders to build a fort, to be named Fort 
Knox'- when completed, and to take the rest over on the 
Ohio where they would be in striking distance of any 
threatened point. Having determined on this, Harmar left 
Vincennes October 1, and, following Clark's Trace, reached 
the Falls in six days, a march of 130 miles. The country, 
he observed, was hilly, but would be excellent for wheat. 

11 St. Clair Papers. II. 23-2(;. 

i2Locatefl ou a bluff overlooking the Wabash, about two miles above 
Vincennes. 



INDIAN WARS 



99 




Tin: NouTiiwKST 'iEaiaxoKY. 17!I5. By E. V. Shocki.ey. 



100 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

He left Captains Walter Finney and John Mercer^'* at the 
Falls — Fort Steuben — and, on October 28, he continued his 
voyage up the Ohio to winter quarters at the Muskingum. ^^ 

Everything now waited on the new government of the 
Northwest Territory, which was duly organized early in 
the year 1788. The governor, Gen. Arthur St. Clair, was a 
veteran of the Revolution who, the pioneers thought, would 
soon restore peace and order to the distracted border. The 
Secretary of Congress delivered him a carefully drawn set 
of instructions for the government of this, the first Ameri- 
can colony. 

A glance at his instructions will show that the Indian 
question v/as the storm center in western politics. He was 
to examine with care the temper of the Indians; was to 
remove causes of possible controversy and restore peace; 
was to defend the boundaries laid down at previous treaties 
unless he could make better ones ; was to seek out head men, 
and win them over with gifts; and finally he was to break 
up all confederacies and combinations by lavish gifts to the 
tribesmen themselves, for which Congress set aside $26,- 
000 ; always keeping in mind the acquisition of as much 
territory from them as he could. 

St. Clair did not find the practice of Indian diplomacy 
as easy as the theory. The mere mention of a land cession 
v/as enough to break up a council. He sent out invitations 
to all the tribes to meet him, arranged all the preliminaries, 
had his presents ready to distribute, but the Indians came 
not. Out of deference to those Indians who had sent a 
friendly message to Congress, this meeting had been ap- 
pointed for the Falls of the Muskingum, about seventy miles 
up that river. On second thought it had been decided to 
hold it under the protection of Fort Harmar. The Indians, 
as usual, met on the Maumee to confer with the English 
agents, but the desire for peace prevailed and all started 
for the treaty ground on the Muskingum. For some un- 
known reason the main body never arrived. It was said 
that they met, on the way, a messenger from the governor 

i?'Heitman, Historical Register Officers C'liitinentdl Army. 291. 
^i St. Clair Paper.o. II, 33. 



INDIAN WARS 101 

who made known to them that the governor had no power 
to restore the Ohio river boundary line, and that they forth- 
with resolved on war. This report may be true as to the 
Wabash Indians, but a few of the Wyandots and Iroquois 
attended, and, on January 9, 1789, signed what is known 
as the Treaty of Fort Harmar. The substance of this was 
merely a reaffirmation of previous treaties. Only a few 
of the warlike tribes attended, and St. Clair was not slow 
to make up his mind that war was the only means of re- 
storing peace. Neither was evidence lacking or misunder- 
stood as to the part the English were playing ; but the gov- 
ernment was in no position to take up that question, and 
meanwhile the western agents had to bear the impertinence 
of the English with what grace they could.'- 

During all these negotiations Governor St. Clair had 
been preparing for the last resort. He wrote the Secretary 
of War, September 14, that all the northwestern Indians 
were hostile and suggested a plan to reduce them. This 
plan consisted in sending a number of expeditions that 
would strike the Indian towns at the same time ; a column 
of 1,000 men could, he suggested, reach the Wea Towns in 
150 miles from Clarksville; a column of 1,400 men and two 
guns could reach the Miami Towns (Fort Wayne) from 
the mouth of the Little Miami in 200 miles ; a column of 
1,000 men could strike the Cuyahoga Towns from Beaver 
creek in ninety miles; and a column of 500 men could de- 
stroy the Vermillion Towns from Vincennes in ninety miles. 
John F. Hamtramck, Josiah Harmar, John Wyllys, and 
John Doughty, were suggested as capable leaders, t- The 
request for two guns for the expedition against the Miami 
Towns is significant. The British had constructed a fort 
for the Indians on the Maumee, and St. Clair was expect- 
ing what Wayne actually found five years later, i" 

During the year 1789, the Wabash valley was like a 
hive of angry bees. No large war parties were organized, 

15 St. Clair Pnper.s, II, 101. 105. 

16 All had been officers in the Continental Army. Ileitmau, Histori- 
cal Register Officers of Continental Army (index). 

17 St. Clair l^apers, II, 89. 



(8) 



102 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

but small bands of young warriors, five to twenty in a band, 
ranged the settlements from Pittsburgh to Kaskaskia. 
They vied with each other in the hideous cruelty they could 
inflict. Some hung around the remote settlements, where 
they contented themselves with stealing horses ; others in a 
spirit of deviltry penetrated 100 miles into the settlements 
to burn and murder. Some of their prisoners they carried 
to Detroit and sold for ransom, others they treated to un- 
speakable brutalities, and at last tortured to death at the 
stake. There is a tradition that a secret society or fratern- 
ity of Miami warriors of approved courage and cunning- 
met at stated intervals at the site of Fort Wayne, and in- 
cluded in the program of every such entertainment the 
burning of at least one captive, and in its banquet the eating 
of his flesh.^s 

The government, especially President Washington, was 
reluctant to go to war. Though hostilities had never ceased 
since the Revolution, the older Indian chiefs kept sending 
word that they had buried the hatchet. Indian councils, 
directed by English agents and American renegades, re- 
solved on peace, and deplored, in language meant for the 
government ear, the lawless acts of the young bucks. One 
who reads the negotiations of these bloody years cannot 
escape the evidences of Indian or British duplicity. 

The white men were no doubt often too aggressive. 
Members of Congress as well as Washington pointed out 
that the Indians v%^ere the ancient owners of the soil to 
which they still had a just title. If it was intended that 
the Mississippi Valley should be a hunting preserve for a 
few savages without hope of progress, then the Americans 
were wholly wrong. But if it was intended that it should 
be the home of a powerful nation, the seat of the highest 
civilization, then it was high time our ancestors were en- 
tering into their homes and going about their work. 

The Kentuckians did not bear these savage hostilities 
tamely. A raid was planned for the Wabash towns, but 
resulted in nothing more than the destruction of the vil- 
lages of a few half-friendly Piankeshaws on the lower Wa- 

is American State Papers, htdlau Affairs, I, 58. 



INDIAN WARS 103 

bash. The little garrisons of regular troops could do noth- 
ing to protect the settlers from the roving bands of savages. 

There were other circumstances that caused the gov- 
ernment much anxiety at this time for its western terri- 
tories. Sir Guy Carleton, later Lord Dorchester, was play- 
ing high stakes for the recovery of the whole Northwest. 
He was the instigator of the English Indian policy, and 
now, hearing that the Kentuckians were chafing at the re- 
straints placed upon them by the general government, and 
at the same time left unprotected, sent the infamous Dr. 
John Conolly, a loyalist refugee, ''• among the Kentuckians 
to promise them protection from the Indians and the free 
navigation of the Mississippi, if they would declare their 
independence. But the memory of Sir Guy Carleton and 
his conduct were too recent. 

About this same time the Spanish commandant at St. 
Louis sent a letter to the Creoles at Vincennes inviting them 
to settle on the west side of the Mississippi, where he would 
give them free lands and the free navigation of the river 
to New Orleans. Major Hamtramck intercepted one mes- 
senger before he could deliver his letter, but he did not 
know how many had escaped him.'-" 

Realizing by the close of 1789 that the treaty of Fort 
Harmar and the distribution of gifts made at that time 
were not going to pacify the tribes, St. Clair determined 
to visit the western country, and try once more to get 
the Indians to meet him in a general council at Fort Knox. 
He set out from Marietta about New Year, and reached 
the Falls at Clarksville January 8, having stopped at Cin- 
cinnati long enough to lay off Hamilton county and name 
Cincinnati. He remained at Fort Steuben (Clarksville) 
nearly a month, appointed some civil officers, ordered a 
boatload of corn to be sent to the starving people at Vin- 
cennes, composed a long letter to the Wabash Indians, and 
sent it to Major Hamtramck, by whom it was to be for- 
warded by a trusty interpreter to the tribes.-^ 

19 Sabine, Anicrican LoyaViHts of the Rci:oJution. I. 381. 

20 St. Clair Papers, II. 101. 105. 

21 St. Clair Papers;, II, 130. 



104 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

From the Falls St. Clair continued his voyage to Kas- 
kaskia. He found the people of that country in the last 
stages of distress. The coming of the Virginians had been 
a plague to these western communities. They had disposed 
of all their goods for Virginia money which soon depreci- 
ated and later was repudiated. Many of the American sol- 
diers had remained in the country to continue a mock gov- 
ernment under which they robbed the people. Thrice in 
successive years the Mississippi had destroyed their crops, 
and the crop of the preceding year had been completely 
ruined by an untimely frost.- - 

St. Clair could do little more than listen to their tales 
of sorrow. While engrossed in these affairs a letter from 
Hamtramck notified him that the Wabash Indians were in 
arms, and an army of 1,000 savages was liable at any time 
to deluge the frontier in blood. Bands of marauders 
robbed and murdered the emigrants on the Ohio, Settlers 
were not safe on that river or anywhere to the north of it. 

§ 20 The Conquest of the Miamis 

Immediately on receipt of the letter which St. Clair 
had written him from Clarksville, Major Hamtramck dis- 
patched an interpreter to the Indians with it. This inter- 
preter reached the Vermillion Towns, but in consequence 
of a threat against his life hastily returned to Fort Knox. 
The commandant at once dispatched Antoine Gamelin with 
the letter. This Frenchman was well known to the Indians 
and succeeded in his mission. A detailed study of his visit 
will show clearly the attitude of the northwestern Indians, 
the nature of the Miami Confederacy, and their depend- 
ence on the English at Detroit. 

He set out from Fort Knox, April 5, 1790, on his way 
to Miamitown at Fort Wayne, intending to visit all the 
towns near the Wabash as he went. The first place he 
made was the Kickapoo village of Chief Crooked Legs. This 
being a detached tribe and near Fort Knox, was well dis- 
posed and returned the messenger a pleasant answer. 

22 St. Clair Papcifi, I. 165. 



INDIAN WARS 105 

Thence Gamelin proceeded to the Vermillion Piankeshaws. 
The head chief and nearly all the warriors were at home, 
and received the proposals of the Americans gladly. How- 
ever, they refused to make any answer until they had word 
from their elder brothers, the Miamis. The head chief cau- 
tioned the messenger against the Lake Indians, who, he 
said, were under the British influence. The Shawnees were 
also on the warpath, he observed. After promising to stop 
on his way back, Gamelin continued his journey. On April 
10, he met a war party of Kickapoos, but they said they 
were going against the Chickasaws. He asked them to go 
past Vincennes on their way, and shake hands with the 
commandant. Next day he reached a large Kickapoo vil- 
lage, and at once called a council of the head chief and 
warriors. He presented, along with St. Clair's letter, two 
belts of white wampum. It was at this town the former 
messenger had been turned back. The chief informed 
Gamelin that the threat of war in his letter was very dis- 
pleasing. This threat read : "I do now make you the offer 
of peace: accept it or reject it as you please." Gamelin 
at once changed it. They next found fault with him for 
bringing no gifts. He was told, however, that he might 
continue his journey to the upper towns in safety. As far 
as making him a formal answer was concerned, they would 
have to defer that until they could learn the pleasure of the 
Weas who owned the lands. They had confidently expected 
from the agent of their American father a draught 
of milk to put the old men in good humor, some powder 
and ball for the young men in their hunting, and some 
broth for the children. 

On April 14, the Weas and Kickapoos were assembled 
and the letter read. Again the answer was, they could 
do nothing without the consent of the Miamis. The agent 
was told to continue to the Miamitown, see what the head 
chiefs said, stop on his way back, and let them know the 
answer. Our young men, they said, are under the influ- 
ence of the English at Detroit so that we cannot restrain 
them. Again he was told that when the Indians met the 
Americans in council, they always came away naked. They 



106 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

asked if St. Clair's legs were broken so that he could not 
visit them himself. The English call us women if we do 
not take up the ax. Our old men are for peace, but our 
young men are gone to war. 

On the 18th he arrived at L'Anguille, or the Eel 
River Town. Neither the sachem nor war chief was pres- 
ent. The speeches were read to such of the warriors as 
were at home, who seemed well pleased, invited the mes- 
senger to stop on his return, and sent some of their men 
with him to Miamitown. On the twenty-third, Gamelin 
arrived at the Miami capital. The next day he called the 
Miamis, Shawnees and Delawares into council, and read 
them his letters. The French and English traders were 
also invited to be present. To each nation he delivered two 
belts of wampum, Gamelin then called their attention to 
the treaty of Muskingum, which they disavowed, saying 
it was made by irresponsible young men without the tribe's 
knowledge or consent. The only purpose at this time, he 
continued, was to reestablish peace. The head chief said 
he was pleased with the spirit and would soon answer. In 
a private conference the chief told the messenger not lo 
place any significance on what the Shawnees said. They 
were soreheads and were always disturbing the peace of 
the nations. He denied that the Miamis had done any of 
the mischief on the Ohio river. His young men only went 
out to hunt. It was the Shawnees that did all the mischief. 

On the 25th, Gamelin visited Blue Jacket, the 
Shawnee chief, in his tent. Blue Jacket said that they all 
understood his speech and were pleased with it, but that 
they could give no definite answer till they had heard from 
their father at Detroit. They had decided to return the 
wampum and send the messenger on to Detroit to 
speak to the English. "From all quarters," he continued, 
"we receive speeches from the Americans and no two are 
alike. We suppose that they intend to deceive us — then 
take back your branches of wampum." 

On April 26, five Pottawattomies arrived with two ne- 
groes, whom they sold to the traders. Next day Gamelin 
again called on LeGris, the chief of the Miamis. His war 



INDIAN WARS 107 

chief was also present. He was told not to mind what the 
Shawnees had said, but to wait and his letter would be pres- 
ently answered. On the 28th, he was told he 
might return when he pleased, as they could make no posi- 
tive answer till they had advised with the Lake Indians 
and the commandant of Detroit. The chief asked for and 
took the wampum refused by the Shawnees. Agents of the 
Five Nations were present, conferring with the western 
Indians on some important affairs. Three Wyandots also 
arrived at the council house with their belts of wampum, 
but LeGris would not disclose the purpose of their mission. 

That night at supper. Blue Jacket, the Shawnee, again 
insisted that Gamelin go to Detroit and meet the English. 
Next day at a grand council Gamelin informed them that 
his mission was at an end ; that his orders were not to go 
to Detroit unless forced. Blue Jacket assured him that 
what he said in reference to going to Detroit was merely a 
suggestion; they did not mean to force him. All declined 
any formal answer, though they promised within thirty 
nights to send messengers to Vincennes with written 
answers. 

On May 2, Gamelin turned homeward, visiting all the 
tribes on his return and finding evidence on every hand 
of the hostile attitude of the savages. The whole trouble 
lay in the British influence at Detroit and the desire for 
the Ohio river as their boundary line. The arms, ammuni- 
tion and other supplies came from Detroit, and the constant 
irritation that kept the savages ill-tempered came from the 
American squatters north of the Ohio. Gamelin arrived 
at Vincennes May 17, and the substance of his report was 
communicated to Governor St. Clair at Kaskaskia. As 
soon as that officer learned of the threatening conditions 
he hastened back to Fort Harmar to meet the bursting 
storm.-'^ 

Word also reached St. Clair of Shawnee depredations 
on the Ohio. Two boats had been captured at the mouth 
of the Scioto. A few days later two more were taken con- 

-3 St. Clair Papers. II, 132, 135. The Journal of (Jamelin is given 
entire in American State Pafxru. tnititni Affairs;, I. 03. 



108 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

taining property worth $7,000. Some men boiling salt at 
Bullitt's Lick, fourteen miles below Louisville, were at- 
tacked and killed. A man coming down the river a mile 
above the Falls was ambushed and killed.-^ 

Under these conditions St. Clair hastened back to Cin- 
cinnati in order to hold a conference with General Harmar. 
Congress by acts of the previous year had authorized St. 
Clair to call out the Virginia and Pennsylvania militia. 
The governor of Pennsylvania paid no attention to the call 
and an additional 500 men had to be levied on Virginia. 
Three hundred of the militia who were to rendezvous at 
Fort Steuben were thence to march to the aid of Ham- 
tramck at Fort Knox in an attack on the Weas and Kicka- 
poos. The remainder of the militia gathered at Fort 
Washington to aid Harmar. The appearance of the militia 
did not encourage Harmar. They had neither axes nor 
cooking utensils. Their arms were bad and out of repair. 
It seems in many cases broken guns were brought pur- 
posely to have them repaired by the gunsmiths of the regu- 
lar army. The inspector gave it as his opinion that all the 
firearms in Kentucky unfit for use were brought by the 
volunteers to Cincinnati, The most distressing fact was 
the endless jealousy and bickering over the command. Col. 
John Hardin-'' was senior commander, but Colonel Trotter 
was a personal favorite of the men. Instead of hushing 
up the quarrel the latter officer encouraged it. The diffi- 
culty was increased by the fact that a great many of the 
militia were old men and boys who had never trained be- 
fore. A compromise was eflTected by making Colonel Trot- 
ter, commander of the Kentucky battalion, and Colonel Har- 
din, commander over all the militia. The contractors sup- 
plied the army by means of pack horses. This service re- 
quired 868 horses equipped with pack-saddles, rope and 
bags. The department was in charge of a horsemaster- 
general, eighteen horsemasters, and 130 pack-horse drivers. 

All told, the little army numbered 1,453, of whom 320 

-i American State VaperH, Indian Affnitx. I. 84-95 These nre only 
saiuijles of the scores of such crimes coiuniittetl. 

25 Heitman. Historical Register Officers Continental Army, 209. 



INDIAN WARS 109 

were regulars under Majors John Wyllys and John 
Doughty. They took up the march to the Indian towns on 
the last day of September, 1790. By October 15, the ad- 
vance had reached the Maumee Towns, which were de- 
serted. No Indians were seen, though plentiful signs indi- 
cated that a large force was in the immediate neighborhood. 
As soon as General Harmar was satisfied that there was 
to be no resistance by the Indians, he decided to march on 
the Wea Towns of the Wabash. On inquiry it was found 
that the packhorses had been stolen by the Indians. Colonel 
Trotter was sent out with 300 men to scour the country 
for Indians. The militia was disorderly and nothing at all 
was accomplished. The next day Colonel Hardin, while 
making a circuit with the same troops, stumbled on a small 
party of Indians near the St. Joseph, and lost thirty men 
in the fight. The militia fled at the first sight of the In- 
dians, some throwing away their loaded guns. The little 
party of regulars was deserted and twenty-two out of the 
thirty men killed. 

The next day all the property of the Indians around 
the junction of the St, Mary and the St. Joseph, was de- 
stroyed, after which the army started on its return to Cin- 
cinnati. It would have been fortunate had it continued. 
But Colonel Hardin bore the defeat of the day before on Eel 
river with impatience. The disgraceful conduct of the mi- 
litia, he thought, ought to be retrieved, and he therefore 
asked if he might lead a command back to the ruined towns 
at the head of the Maumee. The army had spent the night 
of October 20 at the Indian village of Chillicothe, two miles 
down the river from the present site of Fort Wayne. It 
had reached a point seven miles further on when a detach- 
ment of 400 men was sent back under the unfortunate 
Colonel Hardin. By a rapid march on a beautiful starlit 
night the troops reached the junction, where they found 
the Indians encamped on the east side of the St. Joseph 
just at its junction with the St. Mary. A battalion was 
ordered to cross the St. Mary's, and circle to the west, in 
order to cut off the retreat of the Indians. The militia 
again disobeyed orders by firing at the first Indian that 



110 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

was seen. The shots roused the rest of the Indians, who 
fled in small bands in different directions. The main body 
of the warriors, however, under the Little Turtle, who had 
planned the ambuscade of two days before, was stationed 
under the high banks of the Maumee at the ford a short 
distance below the junction. Here as the regulars under 
Major Wyllys attempted to cross, the Indians fell upon 
them and killed nearly all of them, including the com- 
mander. Most of the men fell in the stream, then very low, 
and their blood reddened its waters for a great distance. 
Excepting a small squad of cavalry under Major Fontaine, 
who fell at the first fire, the militia, 200 of whom were near 
the ford, took no active part in the fight, returning hastily 
but unmolested to Harmar's camp as soon as they realized 
that the regulars were annihilated. When the frightened 
militia reached the main camp there was almost a panic. 
Hardin urged the commander to lead his whole army forth- 
with against the Indians. This perhaps would have been 
the best thing to do had the commander been a more ener- 
getic soldier, but, considering the jealousy among the offi- 
cers, the ill-feeling between the regulars and militia and 
the insubordination of the army as a whole. General Har- 
mar certainly did the wise thing in getting them out of 
the Indian country.-^ 

In the meantime Major Hamtramck with a force of 400 
men moved up the Wabash to the Vermillion Towns, which 
he destroyed. Meeting with no Indians, he returned to 
Fort Knox, having accomplished nothing. In explanation 
of his failure it should be said that Major Hamtramck de- 
pended on Major Whitely of the militia to bring supplies 
from the Falls. The latter started with ninety-six beeves 
and arrived with twenty, having lost or sold during the 
same time 200 of his horses. The year's campaign closed 
with all the prestige of victory with the Indians. They had, 
indeed, been despoiled of their houses, their corn and beans, 

26 jS7. CIdir J'djicrs. I. I(i7-17t». A good niiii» of tbe campaign is given 
in the Nortlnrest Under Three Flaff.<<. Cltarh'!^ Moore. 346: American 
State Papers. Militarii. I. 20. The recoi'd of the oonrt of inquiry held 
September 15. 1791, at Fort Washington, is there given. 



INDIAN WARS 111 

fruits of the toil of their squaws and children. The In- 
dians later gathered together hastily, and built huts to face 
the cold and famine of the long northern winter, while on 
the other hand the exposed settlers awaited in dread the 
vengeance of the tribesmen, which they knew the unsuc- 
cessful expedition would draw down upon them. 

In this expectation they were not mistaken. A long 
list of murders and robberies followed, beginning January 
2, 1791, with the massacre at the Big Bottoms of the Mus- 
kingum. The outlying squatters, the women and children, 
the man in the field, the lone travelers on road or river, 
going to church or to the mill, above all, the immigrants 
on the upper Ohio, all felt the hardships of this merciless 
Vv'ar. It was reported that 300 white persons were lost on 
the Ohio river alone. The Indians in bands of twelve or 
fifteen lay concealed about the stockades or settlements 
until an opportunity offered to kill or capture without dan- 
ger to themselves, after which they made off" at the rate 
of forty miles a day with scalps or captives. Pursuit or 
punishment was impossible except by the old Indian hunt- 
ers who outrivaled the warriors themselves in deeds of 
cunning murder.-^ 

The Americans had learned a few things by the failures 
of the year 1790. The policy of employing regulars and 
militia together had proven a mistake, but it seemed noth- 
ing less than a national disaster would convince some of 
the old army officers of it. Petitions were presented to 
the President asking him to entrust the defense of the 
frontier to the militia and offering to raise a sufficient 
force to conquer the country at once. On the other hand 
intelligent observers recognized the uselessness of retalia- 
tory expeditions in ending the war. December 2, 1790, 
Major Hamtramck wrote St. Clair that, judging from the 
experience of years of Indian warfare, the Americans 
would never be able to end the war as long as the British 
held the northern posts; that if the Indians offered peace 
in the spring it ought not to be granted as it would only 

^T American State Papers, Indian AjfairH, I, S3, seq.; also 107 seq., 
where is given tlie corresjiondenoe conceruing uortlawestern Indians. 



112 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

be a ruse of the mischief -making British; that Indians 
could not be subdued by burning their houses and destroy- 
ing their corn, damages most easily repaired, since they 
live indifferently well on the game from the forest; that 
they could not be decisively beaten in a general engagement 
for they would not fight except at a great advantage and 
when hard pressed would scatter into the forest where 
pursuit was impossible; that the only way to end the war 
was for a regular army to establish a line of forts from 
Vincennes to Lake Erie, overawe the British and dictate 
peace to the Indians.-^ It might be pointed out that this 
was the policy carried out by Gen. Anthony Wayne. Noth- 
ing has caused more wrong to the Indians than humoring 
them in council with the silly fiction that they were the 
equals of the white men. 

But the Kentuckians loved vengeance as the Indians 
loved war. Each party had suffered great cruelty at the 
hands of the other, and neither was disposed to listen to 
reason. In order to gratify the Kentuckians and at the 
same time keep the war in the Indian country while St. 
Clair recruited a regular army, President Washington 
authorized General Charles Scott with the Kentucky mi- 
litia to attack the Wea Towns.--' The expedition was to 
consist of 500 men equipped and paid by the national gov- 
ernment, to start about the first of May, and to be out 
twenty days. The object of the raid was to get some cap- 
tives, especially women and children, to hold as hostages. 
On visiting Lexington, May 5, to see how preparations 
were going forward, St. Clair found 750 men ready to go. 
These volunteers were to meet at Frankfort on May 15, 
1791, and thence proceed down to the mouth of Kentucky 
river, where they would find powder and lead. On May 19, 
the force was at the place of rendezvous ready to start, but 
were kept waiting four days by St. Clair who was expecting 
a report from Col. John Proctor, then on a fruitless mis- 
sion of peace to the hostile tribes. "^^ 

28 St. Clair Papers, II. 136, 197. 

29 Dillon. History of Indiana, 262. 

30 St. Clair Papers, II, 205. 



INDIAN WARS 113 

On May 23, the army set out from the Ohio, and headed 
straight for the Wea Towns. Its way led through the un- 
broken forest across the branches of White river. Rain 
fell in torrents accompanied by storms of wind and light- 
ning. The rivers were high and each skirted by a sv\^amp 
four to six miles wide, making the course a succession of 
quagmires. The muddy paths wore down their horses and 
the rains spoiled their provisions. In eight days the troops 
reached the prairies south of Lafayette, coming upon an 
Indian scout from the villages, but being unable to overtake 
him. The guide. Col. John Hardin, who had volunteered 
for this service, was not sure of the location of the main 
Indian town. All pushed forward as eagerly as their jaded 
horses would carry them, however, until one o'clock when 
they came upon two villages. Ordering Captain McCoy 
and Colonel Hardin with one company to attack the villages, 
the others hurried toward the main town, about five miles 
away, concealed by a grove. On turning the corner of this 
grove the Americans came suddenly upon the Indian town. 
A few warriors had remained in a house at the edge of the 
town to delay the Kentuckians. These were quickly killed 
or brushed aside and the whole force charged into the town. 
The Indians had been warned by the sentinel and were 
crossing the Wabash in great confusion when the Ameri- 
cans reached the bank. The soldiers, dismounting, dashed 
down to the water's edge in time to destroy five canoes, 
killing or capturing the occupants.-^' 

Col. James Wilkinson was ordered to lead a detachment 
of 200 men mounted on the freshest of the horses up to the 
ford two miles above for the purpose of crossing and in- 
tercepting the retreating fugitives, but on account of high 
water did not cross. A company, under Captain Barbee, 
succeeded in crossing just below, some soldiers finding 
canoes and others swimming, in time to cut off a few strag- 
glers, but the larger part escaped unmolested. 

During this time Hardin was busily engaged. He suc- 

31 Geuenil Scott's instructions, nnd bis reports are given in Ameri- 
can State Papers, Indian, Affairs, I. 129, nlso in St. Clair Papers, I, 
129. seq. 



114 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ceeded in surprising the villagers, taking 52 prisoners and 
killing six warriors before a relief party, under Captain 
Brown, arrived with aid. By sundown all the troops had 
gathered in the Wea Village. This was a town of seventy 
substantial houses, some of which were well finished. Sev- 
eral French families lived with the Weas and had intro- 
duced more advanced cultivation than was to be found in 
neighboring towns. Books, papers, and written documents 
made it evident they were in close connection with the Brit- 
ish at Detroit. A large stock of corn, household goods, and 
peltries was burned. 

Early in the morning General Scott ordered Colonel 
Wilkinson with 500 men to attack the town of Kethtipe- 
canunc at the mouth of Eel river, but an examination 
showed that the horses were too much worn for the long, 
hard ride of eighteen miles through the swamp country. 
In this dilemma 360 men volunteered to undertake the 
march on foot. Starting from camp at five thirty in the 
afternoon, they reached the town by forced marches at ten 
forty p. m. and lay on their arms till daylight the next 
morning. An attack was made, but the Indians had quietly 
slipped across Eel river and scattered to the woods. After 
destroying the town the party hastened back to the camp, 
which they reached at one p. m., having marched thirty-six 
miles. June 4, while the army rested, General Scott sent 
sixteen captives, old squaws and children, with a letter to 
the Indians, telling them that if they would return and 
surrender he would spare their town, but he received no 
answer. Next day, after destroying everything, the troops 
set out for the Falls of the Ohio, where they arrived June 
14, without the loss of a man and with fifty-eight prison- 
ers.22 The expedition was creditable to its leader, both 
from a military and humane standpoint. 

As soon as General Scott's troops returned, St. Clair de- 
cided to send out another expedition. He accordingly noti- 
fied the Kentucky military board to call out 500 men to ren- 
dezvous at Cincinnati. The board placed Gen. James Wil- 

32 The names of these prisoners are j^iven in Scott's report referred 
to above. 



INDIAN WARS 115 

kinson in command. Gathering his forces together hastily 
that officer marched away from Fort Washington, near Cin- 
cinnati, August 1, 1791, holding his course for three days 
directly toward the Miami Towns. On August 4, when 
about seventy miles from Cincinnati, he turned to the north- 
west, floundering in the swamps and swollen streams till 
August 6, when he struck a broad trail that led him to the 
Wabash five miles above the mouth of Eel river. Although 
it was five o'clock in the afternoon the soldiers pressed on 
and, two and one-half miles further, came unexpectedly 
upon the village home of the Miami chief, Little Turtle. 
Seeing the Indians fleeing to the woods the troops charged 
across the shallow stream, and succeeded in killing six war- 
riors and taking thirty-four prisoners. Various stories 
were told by the captives concerning the whereabouts of 
the warriors, but Captain Caldwell, who scoured the neigh- 
borhood with a detachment of troops, was unable to find a 
single one. The village, situated about six miles from the 
mouth of Eel river on its northwest bank, was in the midst 
of an impenetrable thicket of brambles, black jacks and 
hawthorns. 

Next morning, after hastily destroying the growing 
corn, the troops set out for the Kickapoo towns on the prai- 
rie, thirty miles to westward. After floundering through 
swamps the greater part of the way they reached the town, 
but their horses were thoroughly worn out. For this rea- 
son the commander decided not to go on to the principal 
Kickapoo town, and, after destroying again the growing 
corn at Ouaitanon, turned homeward by the same route 
which Scott had followed, arriving at the Falls of the Ohio 
August 2. 

Nothing of value was accomplished by these expeditions. 
The Indians of the upper Wabash, confirmed in the belief, 
as taught them by the English, that the Americans would 
be satisfied with nothing less than their destruction, now 
rallied to a man for the war. They were also more success- 
ful in their plea to the Lake Indians, by telling them that 
the Americans would not stop when the Miamis were driven 
away. On the other hand the Americans were lulled into a 



116 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

false notion that the conquest of the Indians was an easy 
matter.33 

As soon as the news of the defeat of General Harmar 
reached President Washington at Philadelphia, prepara- 
tions were begun for a new campaign. It was felt that all 
the moral effects of a victory remained with Little Turtle 
and his warriors. The Secretary of War advised the Presi- 
dent as early as January 15, 1791, that it was necessary to 
attack the Indians at once with overwhelming force, to 
establish a fort at the head of the Maumee, and not only to 
overthrow the Miamis but to curb the Ottawas and Chip- 
pewas. The number of soldiers on the frontier was entirely 
inadequate for this, and he recommended a new regiment. 
Col. John Proctor was sent on a peace mission, though noth- 
ing was hoped for from it. Military preparations went on 
steadily. The expeditions of Scott and Wilkinson were in- 
tended merely as a mask for the larger operations. One 
new regiment of regulars was to be added to the First, 
which was commanded by Hamtramck. These regiments, 
forming the basis of the army, were to be strengthened by 
two regiments of United States levies enlisted for six 
months and all the militia that could be profitably used. 
At the head of this force (never an army) was placed 
Maj. Gen. Arthur St. Clair, the governor of the Northwest 
Territory. Second in command was Gen. Richard Butler, 
who seemed half-hearted in the matter from the first. Col. 
Charles Scott, of Kentucky, was appointed to command the 
militia. It is not necessary to follow the details of this mis- 
guided, mismated, misordered, misdirected affair. The ex- 
pedition was intended to rendezvous at Fort Washington 
July 10, but it was September 7 before General Butler and 
the quartermaster arrived. As soon as Butler arrived a 
jealousy between him and General Harmar sprang up over 
criticisms of the previous campaign. A courtmartial was 
demanded and several days of valuable time spent in taking 
evidence concerning a misfortune which all knew was due 

S3 (ieueral Willinnisou's ofRciiil report is in Aiurrictin State Paperfi, 
Indian Atfairs. I. 133. His report to St. Clnir is given in St. Vlair 
Papers, II, 238. 



INDIAN WARS 117 

to undrilled, disobedient militia. The only man that pro- 
fited by that unfortunate experience was General Harmar, 
who after vainly pointing out to some of the officers that 
another calamity was approaching from the same cause, 
withdrew from the army and retired to Pittsburg. 

In spite of commendable exertions on his own part, St. 
Clair had nothing like an army. Supplies were not on hand, 
guns and ammunition were defective, the militia as well as 
the levies were uncontrollable and wandered about regard- 
less of orders. Colonel Hamtramck, with the First Regi- 
ment — the only disciplined troops in the west — was sent on 
to build a fort on the Great Miami, twenty-three miles 
northwest of Cincinnati. The militia were already desert- 
ing and the Indians were stealing the horses from under 
the walls of the fort. The militia were passed on to Fort 
Hamilton as fast as they arrived in Cincinnati. With noth- 
ing to do and with the fall rains pouring down incessantly 
they soon became discontented and began again to desert. 
There were not enough regulars to prevent this, and it con- 
tinued in increasing numbers. Parties of ten, twenty and 
even one hundred openly took the trail for Cincinnati and 
home. The disaffection rapidly spread to the raw levies, 
who claimed their terms of enlistment had expired. Parties 
of hunters, formed in defiance of orders, were cut off by 
savages who hung on the flanks of the army and noted 
every move. Provisions were obtained with great difficulty, 
being transported on horseback from Cincinnati. It was 
October 20 before the last company of the Second Regiment 
arrived at the latter place. The main division was about 
fifty miles on the march by this time, though straggling 
recruits and deserters were coming and going all along the 
way. On October 31 a full company of militia marched 
off for home, declaring their intentions of stopping the pack 
horses on the way to obtain provisions. For fear of trouble 
the entire First Regiment was sent back as far as Fort 
Jefferson to protect the supply train against these muti- 
neers. 

The army continued at a snail's pace in the direction 
of Miamitown. The continual rains made the whole coun- 

(9) 



118 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

try an almost impassable swamp. Five miles were con- 
sidered a good day's march. As they proceeded, the In- 
dians, in large bands, were seen prowling around. 

On October 3 the army marched about nine miles, reach- 
ing camp after dark. Marching was difficult in the swampy 
country, and the men were so tired when they arrived that 
no attempt at fortifications was made. The camp lay on 
the side of a small creek twenty yards wide. The high 
ground was barely sufficient for the regulars to huddle to- 
gether on, and the militia had to pass on about three hun- 
dred yards beyond the stream. This was supposed to be a 
branch of the Miami, but it proved to be the headwaters of 
the Wabash. 

The sentinels were restless all night. Their frequent 
firing at what they took to be Indians kept the camp dis- 
turbed and the officers alarmed. Skulking Indians were re- 
ported seen by the guards. About ten o'clock General But- 
ler sent out a captain and thirty men to make a reconnois- 
sance. This officer reported an Indian army in the neigh- 
borhood, but the report did not find its way to the com- 
mander, St. Clair. 

The fact was that an Indian army had been following 
St. Clair for several days. It seems that the Indians had 
feared Major Hamtramck and the First Regiment. Now 
that these old experienced Indian fighters had been sent to 
the rear, it was decided to make an attack. All night Little 
Turtle's forces had been taking position for the early battle. 
The American troops had been paraded as usual at daylight 
October 4, and had been dismissed for breakfast just as the 
Indian warwhoop gave the signal of attack. At the first 
volley the frightened militia rushed for the camp, three 
hundred yards away. Their stampede threw the front lines 
of the regulars into confusion so that at first the Indians 
met with slight resistance. There was no surprise worth 
speaking of, for all the regulars were under arms and in 
line before the Indians reached them. The attacking In- 
dians spread to either flank and soon had the regulars sur- 
rounded and crowded back on the high ground. The militia, 
huddled together in the center, added to the confusion, and 



INDIAN WARS 119 

interfered with the artillery. The fighting grew warm on 
the left flank and the American lines gave way. But no 
sooner had the Indians advanced to the open ground than 
they in turn were driven back. One battalion after another 
raised the savages with the bayonet but no advantage was 
secured from these charges. The advanced line could not 
be held, and the Indians always followed closely the re- 
treating soldiers. They were adepts in hiding and flitting 
from tree to tree until within a few yards of the whites. 
They appeared only when routed from cover with the bayo- 
net. They soon had most of the officers picked oft" and the 
gunners killed. Not an officer of the artillery was left 
when the few gunners remaining around the battery spiked 
the guns and abandoned them. The troops were rapidly 
becoming an ungovernable mob when the order for a re- 
treat was given. The few officers left gathered together and 
led the way. As soon as the road was gained a precipitate 
flight began. The wounded were abandoned, arms were 
thrown away, and all semblance of organization disap- 
peared. The Indians did not follow the rout far, but turned 
to plunder and scalp. 

St. Clair did all he could with the troops at hand. The 
militia were of no service whatever. Time and again the 
regulars drove the Indians at the point of the bayonet, but 
the riflemen refused to take their places in the line and hold 
them back. When the retreat started they lost all sense of 
disgrace, and ran over the wounded in their haste. Many 
never stopped to eat a meal till they were nearly to Cin- 
cinnati. 

The defeat left the frontier unguarded, but fortunately 
the First Regiment was unharmed, and the defeated re- 
cruits and militia were largely made up of the riff-raff of 
the frontier. Their death was little loss. Thirty-seven 
officers and 593 men were killed or missing ; 31 officers and; 
252 men were wounded. St. Clair was not in uniform nor 
on a horse and that alone no doubt saved him. Winthrop 
Sargent and John Gibson, both well known in early Indiana 
history, were officers and both were wounded. All told, 



120 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the loss was 913. General St. Clair reached Cincinnati on 
November S.^^ 

§ 21 A Year of Negotiations and the End of the War 

Governor St. Clair's shattered army reached Fort 
Washington November 8. December 26, 1791, Secretary 
Knox laid before the President a plan to end the Indian 
War. This plan called for a well-appointed, seasoned army 
of 5,188 men. These men were to be collected and thorough- 
ly drilled before being led into the Indian country. The prep- 
arations of the previous year had been masked by militia 
expeditions, but now, in deference to the wishes of Wash- 
ington, an earnest effort was to be made during the year 
1792 to settle the Indian trouble by negotiations. Pending 
these negotiations the army was to be organized on the 
frontier. Rufus Putnam, superintendent of Indian affairs 
for the Northwest, was entrusted with the work of obtain- 
ing peace. Early in the spring there were, accordingly, dis- 
patched to the hostile Indians three flags under a man 
named Freeman, Maj. Alexander Trueman, a gallant sol- 
dier of the First Regiment, and Col. John Hardin, of Ken- 
tucky. These men were all sacrificed in this futile attempt 
at peace. Major Hamtramck was directed to get in com- 
munication with the Wabash tribes and prepare them for a 
council at Vincennes in the autumn. These Indians, since 
the raid of the previous year, were inclined to be reasonable. 
The Weas grasped the opportunity of sending a delegation 
to visit Scott's prisoners then held at Cincinnati. The 
leader of this delegation, the Wea chief, Jean Krouch, who 
had been intrusted by his tribe with large powers for 
treaty making, died in Cincinnati, but Putnam was so im- 
pressed with the sincerity of the broken-hearted visitors 
who had hoped that their chief would succeed in rescuing 
the prisoners, that he placed prisoners, visitors and a 

34 The official repoi'ts and other papers oouceruing this expedition 
are in American State Papers, Indian Affairs. I. 136. Many details 
are given in St. Clair Papers, I. 117 ; II, 233. For a detailed account of 
St. Clair's Defeat see McMaster. A History of the People of the United 
States. 



INDIAN WARS 121 

goodly store of presents on boats and set out for Vincennes. 
A treaty was concluded there September 27, which ended 
the hostilities of the Wabash tribes and restored to the 
tribesmen about 100 women and children captured the year 
before. After sending a letter from the missionary, John 
Heckewelder, to the Delawares, Putnam left for the east 
with sixteen Wabash chiefs whom he had persuaded to ac- 
company him on a visit to Philadelphia. All efforts to get 
the hostile Miamis into council were unavailing. The white 
men who attempted to reach them were murdered, and the 
advice of Joseph Brant and Captain Hendrick, two Iroquois 
chiefs, whose mediation the President had secured, was un- 
heeded by the victorious Indians, now completely under 
the influence of the British. 

The military preparations were not yet far enough ad- 
vanced to risk another campaign, and it was decided to try 
diplomacy yet one time more. The Indians, to the number 
of 2,000, were assembled on the Maumee. Here, in the 
neighborhood of the British traders, and easily accessible 
from Detroit, provisioned and counseled by the British offi- 
cials, they lay feverishly watching every movement of the 
army under Wayne. Word was sent them by Chief Hen- 
dricks that American commissioners would meet them at 
Sandusky when the buds opened in the spring. For this 
mission the President selected Beverly Randolph, Benjamin 
Lincoln and Timothy Pickering. These men spent the sum- 
mer of 1793 around Lake Erie vainly trying to secure an 
audience with the Indians, but the English succeeded in 
preventing it. The Indians remained firm in their demand 
for the Ohio River boundary. The last hope of a peaceable 
settlement passed, and the blame for the failure must rest 
on the head of Governor Simcoe and his fellow officers of 
Canada.^"' 

As soon as Governor St. Clair had gathered his broken 
army into Fort Washington, he demanded a court-martial 
to determine the blame for the recent disaster. A court- 

35 The papers connected witb these different negotiations are given 
in American State Papers. Indian Atfairs. I, 139-202, 215-225; 335-361, 
524-529. 



122 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

martial being impossible, because there were not enough 
officers of the high rank required to form the court, he re- 
signed as commander. After canvassing the merits of sev- 
eral generals, Washington chose Anthony Wayne to lead the 
new army of the west. 

General Wayne arrived at Pittsburg in June, 1792, and 
began to drill the recruits. Washington directed him to 
spare neither powder nor lead in target practice. After 
drilling till late in the fall, Wayne led his army, now called 
the Legion, to a place about twenty miles down the Ohio, 
which he named Legionville. Early in the spring he con- 
tinued down to Cincinnati, where a camp ground called 
Hobson's Choice, was laid off and drilling began again. 
Target practice was a part of every day's work. The sol- 
diers were taught to use the bayonet and to depend on it in 
fighting Indians. They were drilled especially to fight in 
open order, like rangers, and yet to support each other. 
They were trained in camp-making, fortifying, forced 
marching, maneuvering, and above all in marksmanship. 

Word finally came that the peace commissioners had 
failed and the army of about 2,600 effective men left Cin- 
cinnati October 7, 1793, for the scene of war. On October 
13 Wayne camped in a strong position six miles north of 
Fort Jefferson, where he was joined by General Scott with 
1,000 Kentucky militia. After keeping these troops in 
camp long enough to convince them that he was master of 
the army, Wayne dismissed them for the winter. He estab- 
lished a winter camp at this place in order to protect the 
settlements. The Indians did not dare to separate and 
leave their towns exposed to this hostile army. The camp 
was fortified and named Fort Greenville. An advance 
pai*ty went on to the scene of St. Clair's Defeat and built 
Fort Recovery. At 7 o'clock on the morning of June 30, 
1794, Little Turtle, with perhaps 1,000 warriors, made a 
furious assault on the fort, but a strong detachment had re- 
inforced the post lately, and he was defeated with heavy 
loss. A great many white men, including some officers in 
scarlet uniform, fought with the Indians that day. 

Wayne crept on slowly, drilling his men, covering his 



INDIAN WARS 123 

front with scouts, who kept him posted on the numbers and 
location of the enemy. On August 8 he reached Grand 
Glaize, on the Maumee. This place he called the grand 
emporium of the Indian country. Here the Indian army 
had rendezvoused for the last ten years, but more especially 
since Harmar's Defeat. On all sides were fields of corn 
and pumpkins, indisputable evidence that even these sav- 
ages were taking the first feeble steps toward civilization. 

General Wayne quickly built a fort here, which he named 
Defiance, and hastened on down the river after the Indians. 
These latter fell back sullenly before the Americans, watch- 
ing eagerly but vainly for a chance to surprise them, and 
imploring from the British that aid which they had been 
so often and so freely promised. To give this promise 
color. Governor Simcoe of Canada had led 300 British 
troops to the foot of the rapids of the Maumee and con- 
structed a fort from which the Indians were supplied with 
provisions and ammunition. A short distance above this 
fort was a dense forest strewn with fallen trees, the wreck 
of some previous tornado. Here the Indian army, under 
the Little Turtle, decided to offer battle. 

The Indians were not hopeful. Wayne had, a few days 
before, sent a last offer to treat for peace and the Little 
Turtle had favored accepting it, but English councils pre- 
vailed. At early morn, August 20, the American army ap- 
proached in its usual battle formation, with the dragoons 
on one flank, the mounted Kentucky militia on the other, a 
cloud of scouts far in advance, and the Legion following in 
double battle line with loaded guns and bayonets at a trail. 
There was no possibility of surprise. As soon as the scouts 
located the Indians, the Legion charged and, raising the 
enemy with the bayonet, fired individually at point blank 
range. After the first fire, it was tomahawk against bayo- 
net and the Indians, though double the numbers of the 
Legion, were chased two miles in an hour. Nothing saved 
them from a massacre except the dense woods. The fugi- 
tives sought shelter in vain under the walls of the British 
fort. The Legionaries charged up to within pistol shot of 



124 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the British guns and drove the Indians away from its walls 
to the woods for shelter. Not an Indian was allowed to 
enter the fort, where they had been welcome before. 

The battle of Fallen Timbers was the death-blow to the 
Miami Confederacy. The allied Indians were worn out 
with the long vigil. For two years they had been watching 
the steady approach of the invading army, buoyed up with 
the hope of taking it by surprise, as they had done Harmar 
and St. Clair, or by the aid of the English of defeating it in 
the open field. The result had shown them the futility of 
both hopes. After waiting three days on the field of battle 
and destroying all the property, both Indian and English, 
in the neighborhood, Wayne led his army slowly back up 
the river to where Fort Wayne now stands, destroying 
everything as he went. Fort Wayne was completed Octo- 
ber 22 and named by Colonel Hamtramck. The Legion re- 
turned to Greenville to winter quarters, Hamtramck, with 
his regiment, remaining at Fort Wayne.'^'' 

The Indians, after their defeat, gathered around the 
western shores of Lake Erie and spent the winter in hunger 
and misery, subsisting on the scanty rations dealt out by 
the British. Governor Simcoe, agent McKee, and the Mo- 
hawk chief, Brant, encouraged them to continue the war 
but their spirit was broken. The Little Turtle, Buckongahe- 
las, Tarke, Le Gris, Blue Jacket, Captain Jonny, one after 
another, visited the Americans and promised to come for 
the council to be held at Greenville the next summer. The 
great Treaty of Greenville which ended this long war, was 
signed August 3 and exchanged August 7. This treaty 
opened about half of Ohio to settlement but none of Indiana 
except a narrow strip east of the line from Fort Recovery 
to the mouth of the Kentucky river. Eleven hundred 
thirty warriors, representing nine nations, were present 
and assented to the treaty. Everything looked promising 
for a long peace. 

Capt. Thomas Pasteur, then stationed at Fort Knox, re- 

36 The papers of Wayne's Campaign are printed in Aiiiericaii State 
Papers, Indian Affairs, I, 487, scq. 



INDIAN WARS 125 

ported that many hostile Indians passed that post on the 
way across the Mississippi during the autumn following 
the battle of Fallen Timbers. General Wayne learned the 
same from other sources. All these blamed the British for 
their misfortunes.^^ 

ST American State Papers, Indian Affairs, I, 550. 



CHAPTER VI 

territorial government, northwest territory, 1788-1800 

§ 22 Organization of the Northwest Territory 

The jurisdiction of France extended over the soil of In- 
diana from the period of its first discovery and habitation 
by white men down to the end of the Old French War in 
1763. Part of what is now Indiana lay within the province 
of Canada and part within the province of Louisiana, the 
dividing line crossing near Terre Haute. The territory 
legally belonged to England from 1763 till 1783 ; but it is 
hardly proper to say there was a government from 1764, 
when St. Ange left Vincennes, till the arrival of Col. J. F. 
Hamtramck, in 1788. Such improvised forms as existed 
are fitter subjects for fiction than history. December 12, 
1778, Virginia erected the Illinois Country into the county 
of Illinois and appointed John Todd county lieutenant.^ As 
soon as the western territory passed under the control of 
Virginia the Continental Congress, September 6, 1780, rec- 
ommended that it be ceded to the United States. 

There were urgent reasons on the part of Virginia for 
making the cession. First of these was the expense of pro- 
tecting and governing the distant colony. The Virginia 
State government, then almost bankrupt, had more than it 
could do to defend its own immediate borders. The second 
was the attitude of the other States. All would oppose 
Virginia's holding this enormous territory, which would 
make it larger than all the others combined. Besides the 
other States had claims on the same lands. These claims 
were shadowy, indeed, as compared with that of Virginia; 
but in times of strife an excuse is frequently as good as a 

1 Henry. Life of Patrick Henry, III. 212; see nlso Ileuuing's Statutes 
of Virginia. IX, 552. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 127 

legitimate claim. The third reason for the cession was 
more statesmanlike and more worthy the noble Virginians 
who then ruled that State. The common ownership by all 
the States of this vast domain would be a powerful bond of 
union for the thirteen States. The sale of its land would 
bring to the national treasury the money to pay the soldiers 
of the Revolution. The first cession by Virginia, made 
January 2, 1781, was on such conditions that Congress 
could not accept it. On September 13 the new Congress of 
the Confederation specified to Virginia terms on which it 
could accept and these were agreed to by Virginia, Decem- 
ber 20, 1783.2 

The principal conditions of this cession, the oldest con- 
stitution of Indiana, were that out of the ceded territory 
federal republican States not less than one hundred nor 
more than one hundred and fifty miles square should be 
constituted, which in due time should be admitted into the 
Union on equal terms with the older States ; that the United 
States should reimburse Virginia for all the expenses in- 
curred in the conquest from the British and Indians ; that 
the settlers who had become citizens of Virginia should be 
protected in their personal rights and in the titles to their 
lands; and, lastly, that the United States should warrant 
to George Rogers Clark and his men the 150,000 acres of 
land promised them by the State of Virginia. The deed of 
cession was signed and delivered to the United States on 
March 1, 1784, bj^ Thomas Jefferson, Samuel Hardy, Arthur 
Lee and James Monroe, the delegates of Virginia to the 
Confederation Congress. -"^ 

The Confederation Congress was anxious to obtain a 
revenue from the sale of western land at the earliest possi- 
ble moment. The endless litigation over land titles, which 
was then distracting Kentucky, warned the government 
that some systematic scheme must be adopted for the sur- 
vey and marking of boundaries. A committee, appointed 
May 1, 1782, reported in favor of marking the land off into 

2 Ben Perley Poore, Constitutions, I. 427. 

3 Ben Perley Poore, Constitutions, 428. These documents are also in 
Thorpe's Constitutions and Charters. 



128 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

lots six miles square, an early reference to our congress- 
ional township. Another committee, of which Madison was 
a member, recommended dividing the ceded territory into 
States and admitting them into the Union — a suggestion 
that was embodied in the Virginia deed of cession. A more 
pretentious, though less sensible, report by a committee, of 
which Jefferson was a leading member, was made March 1, 
1784. The purpose of this committee was to prepare for 
colonial government in the new territory. According to the 
latter report the territory should be divided by lines of 
latitude and longitude into ten States, for which the names 
Sylvania, Michigania, Chersonesus, Assenisipia, Metropo- 
tamia, Illinoia, Saratoga, Washington, Polypotamia and 
Pelisipia were suggested. These States were to have re- 
publican governments and slavery was to be prohibited 
after 1800. 

While these abstract discussions were going on in Con- 
gress, a company of men was organizing in Massachusetts 
to make a settlement north of the Ohio river. This com- 
pany was composed largely of officers who had served in the 
Revolutionary army. Many of them held certificates of in- 
debtedness against the Confederation which they intended 
to use in payment for the western land. Gen. Samuel H. 
Parsons, Gen. Rufus Putnam and Rev. Dr. Manasseh Cutler 
were the directors of the company. Dr. Cutler was sent to 
Congress to make the purchase. His diary indicates that he 
found not only Congress but congressmen sorely in need of 
money. It is enough to state here that by catering to a 
number of speculating congressmen he succeeded in pur- 
chasing 1,500,000 acres of land on the Muskingum river. 
In connection with this purchase Congress drew up a 
scheme of colonial government which has since become 
famous as the Ordinance of 1787. The company demanded 
a free church, free schools, free labor, and a practically free 
territorial government. 

These were the circumstances under which this charter 
was drawn. A wealthy company was ready to buy $3,500,- 
000 worth of land. The New England congressmen were 
anxious to promote the purchase and thereby help the New 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 129 

England company. Many members from the Middle and 
Southern States were personally interested in the success 
of the company. Other members of Congress were in hopes 
of securing lucrative positions in the new government. It 
would have been impossible to interest New England peo- 
ple in a new colony where slavery was the condition of 
labor ; consequently in order that it might sell its lands the 
Ohio Company demanded the exclusion of slavery. 

The Ordinance passed Congress July 13, 1787. "* It pro- 
vided for a temporary government to consist of a governor, 
secretary, and three judges, all appointed by Congress. The 
governor and judges, subject to some important exceptions, 
were to adopt from the old States laws suitable to the gov- 
ernment of the new settlement. Freedom of worship and 
the personal and property rights common to Englishmen 
were guaranteed to the settlers. Schools and the means of 
education were to be encouraged forever as a necessary con- 
dition of free government. The Indians were to be treated 
fairly and their title to the land respected. There were to 
be constituted out of the territory not less than three nor 
more than five States, which were, as soon as they could be 
shown to have at least 60,000 free inhabitants each, to be 
admitted into the Union with all the privileges of the older 
States. 

Primogeniture and slavery were forbidden, and a high 
property qualification was required both for voters and 
officeholders. As soon as there should be 5,000 freemen a 
representative government was promised in which the peo- 
ple might choose their own legislature. Over this legisla- 
ture the governor retained an absolute veto, and the power 
to convene, prorogue and dissolve. This territorial legisla- 
ture was empowered to nominate ten men, from whom Con- 
gress should select five to act as a legislative council — a 
cumbersome and useless process of election quite as imprac- 
ticable as the later electoral college. 

In this liberal scheme of colonial government some of 

4 Ben Pei'ley Poore, Constitutions. I, 420. A good account of this 
land deal is given in McMaster, A History of the People of the United 
States, I. 505. 



130 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the conditions of Virginia's cession had been violated, which 
made it necessary to go back to that State for a ratification. 
This having been generously given in 1788, in the next 
year Virginia granted to the States that might in the future 
border the Ohio river on the north the right of free naviga- 
tion and concurrent jurisdiction on its waters."' 

When the constitution of the United States went into 
effect in 1789 it was necessary to make some new arrange- 
ments concerning the Northwest Territory. This was done 
by an act of Congress August 7, 1789, which gave to the 
President the appointive powers and duties formerly exer- 
cised by Congress.*^ 

§ 23 The Government at Marietta 

The first settlers of Marietta began to cross the Appa- 
lachian Mountains during the winter and spring of 1788.' 
Dr. Cutler, after a consultation with the United States sur- 
veyor, had decided on the Muskingum Valley as the most 
suitable site for the new colony. Here the first settlers 
landed April 7. Arthur St. Clair, the president of Con- 
gress when the sale of land was made to Dr. Cutler, had 
been appointed governor of the new territory October 5, 
1787, but did not arrive at Marietta, the name given to the 
settlement on the Muskingum, till July 9, of the next year. 

The Northwest Territory, of which Indiana was a part, 
now had a regularly constituted, if not very efficient, gov- 
ernment. St. Clair's chief concern was for the Indians. He 
was directed to notice their disposition, remove all causes 
of friction, regulate their commerce with the settlers, keep 
up a friendly intercourse with their chiefs, prevent con- 
federacies among them, and lose no opportunity of acquir- 
ing their lands by purchase. 

The first territorial legislature for the Northwest Terri- 
tory convened at Marietta in July, 1788, and held numerous 

5 Henuing's Statutes, also St. Clair Papers. I. 2T2 ; Burnet. Notes on 
the North icest Territory, 308. 

c United States Statutes at Large, Sess., I, ch. S. 

" The facts given in reference to the purchase of land and settle- 
ment in Ohio can be found in St. Clair Papers, and In Life, Journal and 
Correspondence of Manassah Cutler. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 131 

sessions during the remainder of the year. It was com- 
posed of Judges Samuel H. Parsons, James M. Varnum and 
John Cleves Symmes. Even in the exercise of its limited 
powers it was subject to the veto of Congress. In the or- 
ganization of this government, Congress emphasized the 
value of property qualifications in office holding. The gov- 
ernor was required to be a resident freeholder of 1,000 
acres, the secretary and judges to own and occupy 500 acres 
each. 

The judges were not regarded as lawmakers primarily. 
Besides having a general common law jurisdiction, they 
had the power, when sitting with the governor, to borrow 
or adopt a statute from one of the original States. When 
the temporary government came to an end they surrendered 
all pretense to legislative power, though, as judges, they 
held office during good behavior. 

Congress instructed Governor St. Clair to proceed as 
soon as possible to Kaskaskia and Vincennes to organize 
regular county governments and adjust their troublesome 
land claims. In pursuance of these orders, St. Clair, Secre- 
tary Winthrop Sargent and the judges left Marietta for the 
west December 30, 1789.^ After stopping a few days at 
Cincinnati, where they organized Hamilton county, they 
reached Clarksville, at the Falls of the Ohio, January 8, 
1790. No county was organized at Clarksville, but a tem- 
porary government was authorized by appointing William 
Clark, of Clarksville, justice of the peace and captain of the 
militia. 

From here the governor and his party continued on 
down the river. They reached Kaskaskia by way of the 
Mississippi river, but had scarcely entered into the work 
there before the threatening aspect of Indian affairs on the 
Ohio called St. Clair back to Fort Washington for a con- 
sultation with General Harmar. Sargent was left in charge 
at Kaskaskia. As soon as he had finished the organization 
of St. Clair county and put the machinery of government 
in motion he set out for Vincennes. 

8 8t. Clair Papers, II, 121. 



132 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

§ 24 ViNCENNES Land Claims 

On his arrival at Vincennes, Secretary Sargent found 
a complication of land claims which defied settlement. The 
depository for the orders of the commandant during the 
period of French and English control had been the notary's 
office. The loose scraps of paper on which concessions of 
land had been made were lost, trifled with, or stolen. On 
this account. Acting Governor Sargent was unable to do 
justice immediately in but few cases. 

The earliest of these land claims rested on a reputed 
grant by the Indians. According to a memorial to Con- 
gress, filed by the inhabitants, the Indians of the Wabash, 
at a council in 1742, ceded all the land from Point Coupee 
above to White river below to the inhabitants of Vincennes. 
The record of the treaty had long remained with the regis- 
ter of deeds at the old Post, but an absconding officer, Rau- 
mer by name, took it away with him at the beginning of 
the French and Indian War. The petitioners claimed that 
the Indians had often ratified this gift, afterward extend- 
ing it forty leagues west and thirty leagues east. 

A committee of the House of Representatives, to which 
all these claims were referred, rejected the claim described 
above, on the ground that if such a grant were made it was 
to the French government and would thus revert to the 
United States under the treaties of 1763 and 1783.'^ 

A far larger and more dangerous claim resulted from 
the activity of land speculators during the English rule. 
For presents of trifling value large tracts of land had been 
obtained from the Indians. One of these tracts was claimed 
by the Illinois Land Company. Its agent, William Murray, 
a trader of the Illinois Country, had bought from ten Kas- 
kaskia chiefs July 5, 1733, two large tracts of land border- 
ing the east bank of the Mississippi, and equal in size to 
the State of Illinois. 

In the same manner Louis Viviat, also an Illinois trader 
representing an association of adventurers known as the 
Wabash Land Company, purchased, October 18, 1775, from 

'^American State Papers, Public Lands. I, 2G. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 133 

some Piankeshaw chiefs a block of land 279 miles long and 
210 miles wide lying on either side of the Wabash. The 
deed, which purported to convey about 60,000 square miles 
of land, was duly registered at Kaskaskia and Vincennes. 
These gigantic frauds had been consummated while Hugh 
Lord was commandant at Kaskaskia. It seems that the pro- 
moters were aided and encouraged by the officials, many of 
whom were stockholders in the land companies. They were 
already making arrangements for settlements when the 
Revolution put an end temporarily to their activities. After 
that storm had subsided things did not look so favorable 
for the adventurers. The two companies were accordingly 
merged April 29, 1780, and their joint affairs placed in the 
hands of a committee of three, James Wilson, William Smith 
and John Shee. The Old Congress, having taken no notice 
of a memorial presented to it by these men in 1781, nothing 
further was done until December 12, 1791, when the agents 
of the company offered to surrender their whole claim if 
the United States would re-convey to them one-fourth of 
the land in the original claim. 

On this modest claim of some 30,000 square miles the 
Senate made an adverse report, basing it on the ground 
that contracts between Indians and private parties for the 
conveyance of land were void. However, a House commit- 
tee reported April 3, 1792, that since this contract was 
made before the Declaration of Independence and had ex- 
tinguished the Indian title there was no other title remain- 
ing and the deed was therefore voted. To this it was an- 
swered that the proclamation of George III, October 7, 
1763, strictly forbade anyone except government buying 
land from the Indians. This policy laid down by King 
George was adopted and has been followed by the United 
States. On this account all these western land claims, laid 
before the Revolution, and based on cessions by the Indians, 
have been held invalid.^ •• 

The next series of claims in order of time were those 
based on grants by the French and English commandants. 

^<^ America n State Papcrf;, Piihlic Lands, I, 21. 22; George Henry 
Aklen, Neio Governments West of the AJIeghenies Before 1780. 

(10) 



134 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

From the earliest settlement down to 1779, the commanders 
of the post had exercised the sovereign power of the Medie- 
val king in granting land to any one whom they thought 
worthy. These concessions, or deeds, written of necessity 
on any scrap of paper procurable were in most cases lost or 
misplaced. There was no official register of land titles ex- 
cept the notary. One of these, as we have noticed, during 
the time of St. Ange, ran away with all the public records, 
while another, Mr. LeGrand, who served from 1777 to 1788, 
was guilty of so many forgeries that it was impossible to 
use his papers in adjusting claims. As Mr. Sargent ob- 
served in his report to Congress, not one out of twenty of 
the ancient inhabitants could produce a clear legal title. 

But the actual French settlers could not be dealt with 
as the speculators had been. They had settled around the 
Post, had obtained land, and by their own labor had made 
their farms valuable. Clearly the claims to their farms 
rested on good faith and were favored by Sargent, who 
confirmed their titles where boundaries could possibly be 
ascertained. Even where no definite bounds could be de- 
termined these settlers were not dispossessed, as will be 
seen later. ^^ 

A fourth series of claims dated from the period of the 
Virginia government. 1779-1790. Although Virginia ceded 
the land to the nation in 1783, the government instituted by 
Col. John Todd was not superseded until the arrival of Sec- 
retary Sargent in 1790. However, General Harmar stopped 
the granting of land upon his arrival at Vincennes in 1788. 

When Todd left Vincennes he appointed Col. J. M. P. 
LeGrand his lieutenant. Like the commanders before him, 
Colonel LeGrand granted land liberally to all new settlers. 
In his absence the same power was assumed by the court. 
The members of this court, Francis Bosseron, Louis Ede- 
line, Pierre Gameline and Pierre Querez, in their letter of 
explanation to Sargent, said they had been instructed to 
apportion land to all new settlers according to their needs. 
They insisted, that they followed what they considered the 

11 American State Papers, I'uhJie Lands, 1, 5. A full list of the 
settlers at Vincennes for 1783 is there .aiven. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 135 

law and their duty. This latter statement does not stand 
criticism, since they granted to each other all the public 
land claimed by the town, a quantity estimated at 10,000 
square miles. 

This humorous grant later caused considerable trouble. 
Land speculators, by whom the west has always been in- 
fested, bought up these claims, had them duly recorded, and 
sold the titles thus obtained to innocent settlers for what- 
ever they could obtain. As much as 1,000 acres would be 
given for a horse or gun. Gov. William H. Harrison wrote 
to Secretary of State James Madison January 19, 1802, that 
he was expecting 500 of these defrauded people to come into 
the territory to settle during the coming spring. 

The lieutenant of Kaskaskia had likewise made numer- 
ous land grants in the Illinois Country. It was impossible 
to give any credence to the claims. Todd's instructions 
positively forbade him making land grants or authorizing 
any one else to do so. There was no evidence that Todd 
authorized it. Moreover, by a proclamation issued at Old 
Kaskaskia, June 15, 1779, he warned all persons against 
making settlements, especially on the bottom lands of the 
Mississippi, Ilinois, and Wabash rivers. i- This was in- 
tended to keep out the squatters, whose manner of locating 
land was just then causing so much confusion in Kentucky. 
It is hardly necessary to state that all these claims under 
the Virginia regime were rejected by Sargent. 

A fifth series of claims was founded on the act of Con- 
gress of March 3, 1791. This act followed the recommenda- 
tion of Secretary Sargent made in his report to Jefferson 
July 31, 1790, and confirmed a grant, previously made, of 
400 acres to every head of a family residing in the Illinois 
Country in 1783. Besides these grants to heads of families, 
of whom there were 143, the act confirmed the grants made 
to actual settlers by the Piankeshaws and the grant of 
5,000 acres to the town and known as the commons. 

To each militiaman, enrolled August 1, 1790, who had 
not received land under any of the former provisions there 

12 The procliimnlioii is given in American State Papers, I'uhlie Lands, 
I, 11. 



136 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

were given 100 acres. This was not in payment for any 
services they had rendered but as an earnest for services 
soon to be needed in the approaching Indian War. Lastly, 
those persons who in good faith had improved their home- 
steads, thinking their titles good, were given a title. 

These various conflicting titles seemed to defy adjust- 
ment. A great many who had been heads of families in 
1783 had died or moved away during the hard times follow- 
ing Clark's conquest. Of the 240 or more claims allowed 
under this law, only a few were in the hands of the original 
claimants. Francis Vigo held fifty-eight of these claims 
and others held quite as many.^^^ 

Secretary Sargent appointed four commissioners, James 
Johnson, Henry Vanderburg, Francis Vigo and Robert 
Buntin, to pass on the claims. All of these men were 
placed in the delicate position of judging the validity of 
their own titles. Johnson held seven, Vanberburg, thirty, 
Vigo, fifty-eight, Buntin, seventeen. However, judging 
from the reports which the commissioners themselves made, 
the adjustment gave general satisfaction. 

When the land office at Vincennes was established in 
1804, the register and receiver, John Badollet and Nathan- 
iel Ewing, who superseded the old commissioners, had some 
trouble with Judge Henry Vanderburg, who, it seems, in at 
least one instance, had manufactured a title to 400 acres of 
land. All, no doubt, got as much land as they were legally 
entitled to and most of them got more. In going beyond 
the law the government was not more generous to these 
pioneers than they deserved. The work of locating, sur- 
veying, and finding the rightful owners to these claims oc- 
cupied the attention of the territorial government as well 
as a great deal of that of the United States land office till 
1807. A special complaint of the claimants around Vin- 
cennes was the payment of the high fees charged by the sur- 
veyors. Congress finally put an end to these by paying the 
surveyors out of the national treasury. ^^ 

13 See Sargent's Report, American t^tnte Papers. Public Lanil!<, I. 5-11. 

14 See the pathetic letters of P. Gihault in American Stale Papers, 
Piihlic Lands, I. IG. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 137 

§ 25 Indiana a Part of Knox County 

In addition to adjusting the land claims, Acting Gover- 
nor Sargent had been instructed to lay off a county around 
Vincennes. This was done June 20, 1790. It was named 
Knox, in honor of the Secretary of War. Its ample bound- 
aries were, on the east, the great Miami, on the south, the 
Ohio river to Fort Massac, on the west, St. Clair county, 
and the Illinois river to the junction of the Chicago and 
the Kankakee, thence due north to Canada, on the north, 
Canada. 

John Small was appointed sheriff and became the execu- 
tive head of the new county. The militia was organized 
and placed on an active footing under command of Maj. 
Francis Vigo. Courts were organized, common pleas, quar- 
ter session, and probate. Andrew Heath was appointed a 
justice and John Mills a notary. Samuel Baird was ap- 
pointed public surveyor. Having organized a complete 
county government for these poor, ignorant French pea- 
sants, who were better acquainted with the manorial gov- 
ernment of the Middle Ages than that of the English 
county. Secretary Sargent set out for Fort Washington 
August 21, 1790. This was the first real, organized, civil 
government on the soil of the present State of Indiana. Its 
jurisdiction embraced all of Indiana and large parts of 
Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan. There was noth- 
ing striking or novel in its organization. All the common 
elements of the English county government were present. 
The chief functions were the preservation of order and the 
protection of the people. As was necessary the little com- 
munity was put on a war footing. 

The judges and secretary found moral conditions at 
Vincennes rather startling. Drunkenness and gambling 
were common and murders occurred almost daily. The 
judges adopted laws which they hoped might remedy this. 
The first law, adopted July 19, 1790, forbade anyone selling 
liquor to the Indians in the territory, and forbade aliens 
trading with them at all. Most of the disorder was con- 
nected directly or remotely with the Indian trade. The sec- 



138 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ond law, enacted seven days later, made it unlawful to sell 
or give liquor to the soldiers, and also forbade the soldiers 
to sell or pawn their arms, ammunition or clothing. A third 
law, adopted August 4, reciting that gambling was the 
curse of the little community, prohibited every kind of gam- 
ing, and made illegal all gambling debts and contracts. The 
latter act also limited the use of firearms. ^=^ 

The weight of the government was too much for this 
ancient community that had never felt a need for more than 
the advice of the priest and the will of the commandant. 
An early frost in the fall of 1790 killed most of their crops. 
The expense of having their land surveyed, regular service 
in the militia, the salaries of all the newly appointed offi- 
cers; all of these extraordinary expenses coming together, 
and no money in the country to pay with, discouraged the 
French.^'' This free self-government, so loudly praised by 
the Virginians, was not entirely to their liking. Nor were 
they reconciled as the fact slowly dawned upon them that 
the good old times of the "old regime" were gone forever. 
The French citizens showed little capacity for political af- 
fairs and the offices were soon all in the hands of the Vir- 
ginians, Excepting Colonel Vigo, who commanded the mili- 
tia, and Robert Buntin, the recorder, no Frenchman held 
office for any considerable period. 

§ 26 Government Under the Judges 

As soon as the Ordinance of 1787 was proclaimed in the 
territory, the settlers on the Wabash and in Illinois became 
alarmed for their slaves. The French residents had been 
allowed to hold slaves under the kings of France and Eng- 
land. These rights had not been questioned by the Vir- 
ginia government and no one expected any interference by 
the national authority. St. Clair gave it as his opinion that 
the Ordinance was not retroactive and hence would not 
affect slaves held at the time but would prevent more being 

15 Si. Clair Papers, II, 167. 

itj Dillon. History of Indiana, 224; St. Clair Papers, II, 148. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 139 

brought into the country. This reassured the people but 
did not entirely allay their fears, as it was a question for 
the courts, and all knew the judges were hostile to the prac- 
tice of slavery. A few masters, fearful of the new law, 
moved with their slaves over into the Louisiana Territory, 
where they were hospitably received by the Spanish gover- 
nor. Other masters retained their slaves but made them in- 
dentured servants, hoping in that way to avoid the law.^'^ 

Trouble soon arose with the judges on the slavery ques- 
tion. Henry Vanderburg, one of the most influential of the 
new settlers, had, apparently, brought slaves with him into 
the territory. When Judge George Turner, of the general 
court, arrived he and Vanderburg were soon involved in a 
quarrel. Vanderburg was probate judge, justice of the 
peace, and had lately been appointed one of the three com- 
missioners to sell liquor to the Indians. Moreover he was 
a friend of Governor St. Clair. Capt. Abner Prior, of the 
regular army and a deputy superintendent of Indian affairs, 
was also involved. In a letter to the governor, Judge Tur- 
ner charged these men with some mysterious crime, which 
he did not name but promised to prove before the court. 
The men were no doubt guilty of that same species of rob- 
bery and peculation that has always disgraced our Indian 
agencies and, besides, Vanderburg had aided in defying 
the officers of Judge Turner's court, but the foundation of 
the trouble lay deeper. It was the judge's attitude on the 
slavery question.''^ 

From the beginning of their service there had been 
friction between the governor and judges. The Ordinance 
of 1787 limited the lawmaking power of the judges to choos- 
ing statutes already in operation in some State. When 
they failed to find a suitable statute they did not hesitate to 
construct a new one. The governor called them to task for 
their liberty and a spirited correspondence was waged. 

17 St. Clair Papers, I. 120, note 2, where the mutter is well suniiDed 
up: Dunn^ Indiana, a Redemption from Slavery. 

. 18 St. Clair Papers, II. 318, Governor St. Clair's letter to Luke Dec- 
ker ; 325. Judge Turner to (jovernor St. Cl.iir; .330, Governor St. Clair 
to Judge Turner. 



140 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Congress favored the governor, but the judges enforced 
them as if they had been approved.^" 

As mentioned before, the governor favored Vanderburg 
in his quarrel with Judge Turner. The latter evidently be- 
lieved, though the matter was never before his court, that 
the Ordinance, once for all, put an end to slavery in the ter- 
ritory. Not only did he think it prohibited slaves from 
being brought into the territory but that it freed those al- 
ready there. Although there were not more than two score 
slaves in Knox county at the time, their loss would have 
been considerable in the eyes of their owners. Governor St. 
Clair had already written Luke Decker, of Vincennes, that 
the Ordinance was not meant to free the slaves. Turner 
was an imperious self-willed man, and opposition made him 
careless of the rights of others. He soon found himself 
confronted by a grand jury indictment and a memorial to 
Congress praying for his impeachment. The memorial was 
the work of William St. Clair, an officer in the Illinois 
Country and a kinsman of the governor. Congress deemed 
it best not to try the impeachment process on account of 
witnesses having to travel so far, and ordered the case to 
be tried by the courts. Turner resigned and left the terri- 
tory, thereby ending the suit,-" 

The judges were not at any time above criticism and the 
governor not averse to fault-finding. In a letter to the 
President, December 15, 1794, he called attention to the 
personnel of the court, composed at the time of Gen. Rufus 
Putnam, a director of the Ohio Land Company, Mr. Symmes, 
owner and agent of the Miami Company, and Mr. Turner, 
who held a large grant of land from Symmes and whose 
title depended on the validity of Symmes' title. A large 
part of the litigation that came before the court arose out 
of land deals to which these companies were parties. It is 
only necessary to call attention to the conditions to show 
how odious such a court would become. 

The judges often engaged in land speculations. One of 

^9 St. Clair Papers, II, 325, 353, teq : American State Papers, Miscel- 
laneous, I, 82, 116; Buruet, Notes on the Northwest Territory. 40. 
20 American State Papers, Miscellaneous, I, 151. 157. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 141 

these embittered the relations of the governor and two of 
the judges throughout this period and divided the settlers 
of Ohio into two parties. Judge Symmes had contracted 
for a large tract of land from the old Treasury Board. The 
purchase was not completed and the new Congress acted 
slowly. The original claim of the judge was to a tract ex- 
tending up the Ohio twenty miles from the mouth of the 
Great Miami. The judge was not content with the first 
boundaries and soon extended his claims, at the same time 
sending his surveyors into the disputed territory. Gover- 
nor St. Clair, in a public proclamation, warned him and all 
others to keep off of the land. Among the settlers who had 
bought lots of this disputed land from Symmes was Judge 
Turner, who, as noted above, proceeded to improve the land 
after personal notice by the governor that he had no title. 
There is apparent in these transactions by the judges that 
same disregard of justice which has characterized all land 
speculators in their dealings with the United States.- ^ 

The judges had a difficult and important work to do. It 
was an irksome and unpopular task to lay the foundations 
of government in this western world, and subject a lawless 
people, even in a small degree, to the restraints of laws and 
courts. The law required that judges be resident freehold- 
ers of five hundred acres. Their meagre salaries of $800 
each would hardly pay expenses on a circuit embracing Mar- 
ietta, Detroit, Cincinnati, Vincennes and Kaskaskia. The 
roads were mere bridle paths, which led for hundreds of 
miles through the Indian country. There were no taverns 
and the nights were spent on the lonely traces, in the dirty 
wigwams of the hospitable natives, or in the solitude of the 
forest with no protection but their blankets. In fair weather 
in spring and autumn the trips were pleasant, but in the 
heat of summer and cold of winter the hardships tried the 
endurance of the strongest. Judge Parsons lost his life in 
an attempt to swim a flooded stream on one of these trips. 

21 The Correspondence is given in .S7. Clair Pa iters, II, 3.30. seq. 



142 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Liberal praise is due these men who labored earnestly for 
the welfare of the rising commonwealths. -- 

§ 27 Civil Government of the Northwest Territory 

The attention of the white settlers was almost complete- 
ly absorbed by Indian affairs until the Treaty of Greenville, 
1795. As indicated before, the judges had at different 
times enacted statutes where it was absolutely necessary. 
In this the judges had exceeded their powers. All such 
statutes had been disapproved by the House of Representa- 
tives February 16, 1795. This rebuke by Congress brought 
the judges to a realization that they were not a sovereign 
body.-^ 

The governor called the judges into session at Cincin- 
nati immediately after the signing of the Greenville Treaty, 
when they at once entered upon the selection of a full code 
of laws for the territory. Of the thirty-eight statutes 
adopted, twenty-six were from Pennsylvania, six from Mas- 
sachusetts, three from Virginia, and one each from New 
York and New Jersey. These laws, printed in Cincinnati, 
have since been known as the Maxwell Code, from the 
name of the printer. It is claimed that this was the first 
job printing done in the territory. The code, with the addi- 
tion of a few statutes adopted in 1798, remained the only 
laws for the territory until the meeting of the first legisla- 
ture in 1799. 

The government of the territory was intended to be as 
simple and inexpensive as possible. At its head stood the 
governor, who was chief executive and commander of the 
militia. He was also a member of the general court for 
adopting laws. Next were the judges, three in number, 
appointed by the President for an unlimited term, and all 
but independent of the governor. Their highest duty was 
the adoption of laws from codes in force in other States. 
This latter limitation they disregarded and over the protest 
of the governor enacted laws which seemed best for the ter- 

2ii The best .-iccount of the early courts is in Burnet's Notes on the 
No7-tJi irr.st TcrrUory. 

2^ Annals of Congress, Third Sess.. 1227. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 143 

ritoiy regardless of any restraint. Later, when Congress 
disapproved these, the judges at least chose the titles from 
older codes, but they still changed the body of the statute to 
suit territorial conditions. The practicing attorneys often 
complained of this illegality and at times threatened to test 
the constitutionality of the laws, but the reflection that the 
same court that made the laws was a last resort in testing 
their validity, caused the lawyers to abandon their pur- 
pose.^-* 

This general court, all members sitting together or one 
alone, was the highest judicial body of the territory. Its 
decisions could not be reviewed either by Congress or the 
Supreme Court. It had original and appellate jurisdiction 
in all civil and criminal cases, and exclusive jurisdiction in 
divorce trials. It was a common law court without chan- 
cery powers. It held regular sessions at Cincinnati in 
March, at Marietta in October, and at Detroit and the west- 
ern counties when the judges could reach these places, the 
exigencies of the Indian war and of traveling making the 
times extremely uncertain. 

The following experience of Judge Jacob Burnet and 
Arthur St. Clair, son of the governor, will give some idea 
of the life of judges and lawyers of that period. In Decem- 
ber, 1799, Mr. St. Clair and Mr. Burnet set out on a trip 
from Cincinnati to Vincennes on professional business, in- 
tending to remain and practice law if the location were 
promising. Mr. Morrison, who was on his way from New 
England to Kaskaskia, with a view to settling on the Missis- 
sippi, accompanied them. They purchased a small Ken- 
tucky boat, sometimes called an ark, in which they em- 
barked with their horses and provisions. In the afternoon 
of the fourth day they arrived at the Falls of the Ohio, 
where they left their boat, mounted their horses and pro- 
ceeded on their journey. About nine o'clock in the evening 
they discovered, at a little distance from the path they were 
traveling, the camp of four or five Indians, which they ap- 
proached. After having shaken hands with the Indians, 
they procured a brand of fire, proceeded some distance 

24 Burnet, A'o/e.s nn the Northwest Territory, 312. 



144 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

further on their way, and halted for the night. Having 
brushed away the snow from the spot they had selected for 
a camp and collected a good supply of wood for the night 
they kindled a fire, took some refreshments, wrapped them- 
selves in their blankets and laid down to sleep. 

The next night they encamped in a rich valley, where 
they found an abundance of fallen timber, thus enabling 
them to keep up a warm fire through the night, before 
which they slept very comfortably till morning. During 
the night a couple of panthers, attracted by the light of the 
fire, approached sufficiently near the camp to serenade the 
travelers with their unwelcome music, but kept a respectful 
distance. The next day they encountered a severe snow 
storm, during which they surprised eight or ten buffalos, 
sheltering themselves from the storm behind the top of a 
beech tree full of dead leaves, which had fallen by the side 
of the "trace" and which hid the travelers from their 
view.-'- The tree and the noise of the wind among its dry 
leaves prevented the buffalos from discovering the men till 
they had approached within two rods of the place where 
the animals stood. The latter then took to their heels and 
were soon out of sight. One of the men drew a pistol and 
fired but without visible effect. That evening they reached 
White river, where they found an old cabin, deserted by its 
builder, in which a large wildcat had taken shelter, and 
seemed at first disposed to vindicate its right of possession. 
It was, however, soon ejected, and the travelers entered and 
occupied the premises without molestation during the night 
and without attempting to do personal violence to the ten- 
ant whom they had driven out. The next morning they ar- 
rived at Post Vincennes, where they tarried about a week. 
In the meantime Mr. Morrison proceeded westward. As 
soon as Messrs. St. Clair and Burnet had closed their busi- 
ness they set out for home, having abandoned the idea of 
engaging in the practice of law in that county, from a con- 
viction that the profits of the business would not be an ade- 

25 The travelers were following the famous "Buffalo Trace." For 
a description of it see Wilson. History of Duhois County, 100. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 145 

quate compensation for the fatigue and loss of time to which 
it would subject them in making the trip from Cincinnati. 

Before they left the post, Colonel Vigo furnished them 
with provisions for their return journey. These included 
a complete apparatus for striking and kindling fires. No oc- 
currence of importance took place on the first day of the 
return trip. With the second began a snowstorm which con- 
tinued during the day. About noon the lawyers halted to 
feed their horses and partake of some refreshments. The 
snow was brushed from a log by the side of the "Trace," 
where they sat down and dined sumptuously on a frozen 
chicken, a biscuit and some old peach brandy, put up for 
them by their Vincennes friends. It was their calculation 
when they left Vincennes to camp that night on Blue river, 
but being mistaken as to the distance they did not reach the 
place till several hours after dark. The weather having 
then moderated, it commenced to rain, and the rain con- 
tinued to fall during the greater part of the night. 

As this crossing place was the best ford on the river it 
had been the common encamping ground of travelers be- 
tween the Falls and Vincennes, from the establishment of 
the Post. As a matter of course all the fuel that could be 
conveniently obtained had been used up. Nothing remained 
in the vicinity but the larger sized trees, which travelers, 
after a tedious day's journey, were not disposed to fell even 
though they might have the means. After rambling through 
the woods in the snow six or eight inches deep, they suc- 
ceeded in gathering together at the place selected for their 
camp some dry limbs which had recently fallen. There they 
kindled a fire, sufficient to boil a pot of coffee and thaw a 
frozen roast chicken ; but by the time their supper was fin- 
ished their stock of fuel was exhausted, and their fire went 
out. Thus situated, their prospects for the night were any- 
thing but cheering, the ground covered with snow, the rain 
falling plentifully, and their fire extinguished. 

Determined, however, to make the best of their situa- 
tion, they scraped away the snow, and with their coats and 
blankets wrapped themselves up as snugly as they could, 
and laid down for the night. Their saddle-bags served as 



146 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

pillows and their saddles were so placed as to shelter their 
heads. In this manner they slept as soundly as circum- 
stances permitted till morning. When they arose from their 
beds they were as wet as they possibly could have been had 
they slept in the bed of the river. Having no fire, they ate 
a cold breakfast, tempered it with a little peach brandy, 
then saddled their horses and started for Louisville, where 
they arrived about dark on Christmas evening. Being very 
much fatigued they partook of a good supper and retired to 
comfortable beds.-^ 

Circuit courts were established throughout the terri- 
tory. Each was presided over by one of the territorial 
judges, who were required to ride the circuit every year. 
It only required one judge to hold circuit court while at 
least two must sit at general court. Besides the regular 
session the judge could hold a special session or, as it was 
called, a jail delivery whenever there was need. This was 
usually done when the sheriff reported several prisoners in 
jail, especially if one of them was a murderer or horsethief 
who would probably hang. 

Below the circuit courts were the common pleas and 
quarter sessions. The former tried civil pleas between 
citizens of the county. There was plenty of w^ork for this 
court in Vincennes, but few competent judges could be 
found. The courts attempted to administer both the com- 
mon law and the statutes. 

The quarter sessions was occupied wth petty crimes 
such as assault and battery, drunkenness and gambling. 
The governor was directed to appoint a sufficient number 
of justices so that one or more would be in every neighbor- 
hood. Three of them could open court and hear the pleas. 
Any one of the justices could issue the common law writs 
and accept bail from persons committed to jail. 

Of the thirty-eight laws found in the Maxivell Code not 
less than thirty deal primarily with the establishment of 
jurisdiction and the procedure of courts. The whole local 
government was in the hands of these local judges and jus- 

26 Burnet, Notes on the Early Settlcnicut of the yortJnccstern Terri- 
tory, 72-75. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 147 

tices. The meetings of the various courts were the princi- 
pal events in the counties. 

Each county had a sheriff, treasurer, coroner, clerk, and 
one or more constables. All were appointed and commis- 
sioned by the governor. County lines were not definite and 
the processes of the court ran for the whole territory. 
Jurors were forced to attend by a heavy penalty for failure. 
The pay of the officers was meager enough and yet it was 
a burden to the taxpayers. The traveling expenses of the 
territorial judges, attorney general, clerk of the territorial 
court, and their servants were paid from the territorial 
treasury, but their local expenses had to be paid by the 
county. 

The local or county government, as stated above, was 
very largely in the hands of the justices of the common 
pleas. There were three county commissioners, one of 
whom was appointed by the justices annually to serve three 
years. The voters of each township elected an assessor an- 
nually. The commissioners and assessors met together as a 
county board for the transaction of county business. They 
passed on the claims against the county, allowing the good 
and rejecting the bad. The valid claims were summed up, 
and a tax levy, sufficient to pay them, was made for the en- 
suing year. 

Each constable made out a list of the property and polls 
of his township, from which the assessor made out the tax 
duplicate for each township. The assessors and commis- 
sioners again met together and elected a collector for each 
township. The collector then took the duplicate for his 
township and collected the tax, which he turned over to the 
county treasurer. If any one refused to pay his tax the 
court proceeded against him the same as for debt, took 
his property, and if enough property was not found put 
the person in jail. If a taxpayer felt that his taxes were 
too high he could appeal to the commissioners sitting as 
a board of equalization. 

The justices of the common pleas decided upon any pub- 
lic improvement for the county, such as building a court 
house, jail or bridge; but the actual work was supervised 



148 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

by the commissioners or assessors. The justices received 
the wolf scalps, and gave an order on the treasurer for the 
bounty. They appointed annually for each township two 
overseers of the poor, who levied the poor rate, or tax, built 
or rented a poor-house, dispensed the public charity, and 
found homes or employment for orphans. At every step 
they were under the direction and control of the justices. 
The latter presided over the orphans' court, and attended 
to all probate matters. 

The justices of the quarter sessions appointed the fence 
viewers, who decided what constituted a legal fence, and 
in cases of dispute passed on the legality of the fences in 
question. The justices recommended tavern keepers to the 
governor who, alone, had the power to license them. But 
after the license was obtained the justices made out a com- 
plete table of rates for every service of the tavern keeper. 
Under the gaming law the justices could summon any man, 
except a freeholder, before them and place him under bond 
for his good behavior. Thus it is not too much to say that 
these justices of the common pleas and quarter sessions — 
the same men usually held both offices — conducted the local 
government in the Northwest Territory. 

Some of the penalties inflicted by the courts forcibly re- 
mind us of the changes of a centuiy. For petit larceny 
the penalty was immediate public whipping, on the bare 
back, not to exceed fifteen lashes. A strong sentiment ex- 
isted against imprisonment for debt, and a law of this 
code forbade it longer than from one term till the second 
day of the next, unless it appeared that the debtor was able 
to pay and would not. 

Considering the possibilities of a criminal for mischief 
under frontier conditions, and the great numbers of vicious 
men who came from the east to the borders to gratify their 
criminal natures, we are rather surprised at the mildness 
of the law and the absence of lynching and other extra- 
legal punishments. Some of the harsher features of the 
law were due to expediency rather than to choice. Horse 
thieves were hung because the pioneers had neither jails nor 
jailers to take care of long-term criminals; and partly be- 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 149 

cause many horse thieves were also murderers. Public whip- 
ping, a brutalizing and demoralizing spectacle any place, is 
explained in many cases by the lack of prisons. Such jails 
as existed would not hold a desperate man, even if the sheriff 
tried to do his duty. Often the sheriff was hand in glove 
with the lawless element. The chief officer of the county 
v/as the sheriff. The first sheriff' of Knox county and thus 
the first in Indiana was John Small, a citizen of Vincennes. 
One canot help feeling, with the Creoles of Knox county, that 
the government was too elaborate for such a poor commun- 
ity ; but it served as a training school in the forms of govern- 
ment, and taught men so that they were able to administer 
the law when the population increased.-' 

By the terms of the Ordinance of 1787 the Northwest 
Territory passed to the second grade as soon as it had an 
adult white male population of 5,000. The population reach- 
ed the required number in 1798. Governor St. Clair then 
issued his proclamation calling on the people to elect repre- 
sentatives. Knox county was apportioned one member in a 
legislature of twenty-two. John Small was our first rep- 
resentative in a law-making body. He was an old resident 
of Vincennes and had served as sheriff, as noted before. 
He was a man of very ordinary ability and had little in- 
fluence among the able lawyers who represented the eastern 
counties, or what is now Ohio. 

The legislature, as directed by the proclamation, met at 
Cincinnati February 4, 1799. Its first duty was to nom- 
inate ten men, from whom the President of the United States 
was to select five to act as a Legislative Council. Vincennes 
was honored by having its citizen, Henry Vanderburg, 
chosen president of the Council. He was a Revolutionary 
soldier of the Fifth New York Regiment of the Continental 

-" Besides Laics of tlie Northivc'^i Territory see Burnet. Notes on the 
Karli/ Settlement of the Norttiiccstern Territory ; Dillon. History of In- 
diana ; William Henry Smith. The Ki. Clair Papers: Dnniel W.'ute Howe. 
The Lairs and Courts of the Northtrest and Indiana Territories ; D. D. 
Bantiu "'The Criminal Code of the Northwest Territory." in Indiana 
Magazine of History. Dec-emlter, 191P, : Geovije E. Howard. An Introdue- 
tion to the Local Constitutional History of the United States. The latter 
is not reliable for Indiana. 

(11) 



150 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Line. Since no laws could be enacted until the President had 
selected the members of the Legislative Council, the repre- 
sentatives adjourned till September 16, 1799. -'^ 

The work of this first legislature was considerable. The 
laws of the governor and judges had not proved satisfac- 
tory. Judge Burnet, who practiced in the territorial courts, 
called them a miserable apology for a code. The important 
work of the legislature was the revision of the code. The 
burden of this duty fell on the lawyers of the eastern coun- 
ties. 

Before the members settled down to their task they 
elected a delegate to represent the territory in Congress. In 
the course of three weeks of electioneering the race nar- 
rowed down to Arthur St. Clair, son of the governor, and 
William Henry Harrison, a son-in-law of Judge Symmes, 
and the secretary of the territory since the promotion of 
Winthrop Sargent. Harrison was elected by a majority of 
one October 3, 1799. He at once resigned his secretaryship 
and hastened to Philadelphia, where Congress was already 
in session when he arrived. 

After this election the legislature went to work on the 
code. The old laws were nearly all repealed or amended and 
a long list of new ones enacted. The members showed their 
position on the slavery question by rejecting the petition of 
some Virginia planters who asked permission to move into 
the territory with their slaves. A member gave it as his 
opinion that the assembly was unanimous in its opposition 
to slavery. This may have been true although both the 
Vincennes members owned slaves at the time. 

The legislature instructed Harrison to use every effort 
to induce Congress to fulfill the promise of the Ordinance 
of 1787 with respect to schools by setting aside the six- 
teenth section in every township for their aid. A protest 
was sent to Congress against the unqualified veto of the gov- 
ernor, and the property requirement for voting. The most 
difficult task the legislature met was to draw up a statute 
in response to a memorial from the commoners of Vin- 

28 Perkins aud Peck. Annals of the West, 507; St. Clair Pa iters, 438, 
446, seq., where the minutes of the session ;ire given. 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 151 

cennes. The petitioners held lands in common on the prairie 
just outside the village. It was their custom to meet at the 
church door after worship in order to decide matters re- 
lating to planting, harvesting, fencing, pasturing and the 
like. The syndic, whose business was to enforce these 
church decisions, of late had found his duty more and more 
difficult. There was endless neighborhood friction and bick- 
ering. The legislators finally enacted a law patterned after 
the old folkmoot laws, which answered the purpose. The 
legislature rose December 19, after enacting thirty-nine stat- 
utes and voting an address to the people. 

§ 28 Harrison in Congress 

Mr. Harrison was elected by the party opposed to Gov- 
ernor St. Clair. He was moreover in full sympathy with the 
Republican spirit of the West as opposed to the Puritanic, 
Federalistic tendency of the old officials, many of whom had 
won distinction in the Revolution. He was never a political 
partisan, though he was always outspoken on any question 
that engaged his attention. 

His constituents in the Northwest Territory desired 
three things — relief from the abuses of the general court, a 
division of the territory, and a land law more agreeable to 
the settlers. To the accomplishment of these things Mr. 
Harrison at once applied himself. He kept out of all party 
struggles in Congress and cultivated the good-will and 
friendship of all. 

On December 6, 1799, Harrison offered a resolution that 
a committee be appointed to inquire into the judicial system 
of the Northwest Territory and recommend changes. It is 
a proof of the high opinion the congressmen had of him 
that they allowed him to become chairman of this commit- 
tee. The land question was not less important to every set- 
tler. No one could buy land without placing himself in the 
grasp of the big land companies. The government at Phila- 
delphia had never succeeded in shaking off the lobby of land 
speculators that had been on its back ever since it came into 
possession of western lands. It had never sold less than 



152 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

4,000 acres in a block, and the speculators declared that if 
the government sold directly to settlers the land market 
would be ruined. 

If Harrison accomplished anything he would have to 
fight the speculators. He soon took in the situation and de- 
cided what to do. On December 24, 1799, he asked for a 
committee to inquire into the land system of the Northwest 
Territory and the method of its sale. No more important 
business came before this Congress and yet the speaker 
showed his appreciation of a son of a signer of the Declara- 
tion by appointing Harrison chairman of this committee. 
On this committee were some of the best men in Congress, 
among them Mr. Gallatin, who at this time read a petition 
from 176 actual settlers — squatters — praying that land be 
sold in small lots so they could get it without being robbed 
by speculators. What these squatters really wanted was 
the right of pre-emption in order to get the benefit of their 
improvements. At the same time the Judiciary Committee 
was considering a plan to divide the territory. Mr. Harri- 
son thus had all his plans before Congress within a month 
after his arrival. 

The Judiciary Committee reported March 3, 1800, in 
favor of the division of the territory by a line running due 
north from the mouth of the Big Miami river. 

Among other reasons for the division, the committee 
urged the following : From southeast to northv/est the ter- 
ritory extended fifteen hundred miles. The two most widely 
separated places for holding court were thirteen hundred 
miles apart. This fact alone would prevent the administra- 
tion of justice. In the three western counties — Knox, St. 
Clair and Randolph — during a period of five years there 
had been only one session of a court having power to punish 
felonies. This made the country a rendezvous for criminals. 
The same was true of the civil courts. Local civil offices were 
left vacant for years. The territory lay open to both Eng- 
land and Spain, each ready to cultivate opposition to the 
American government among the settlers. So far had their 
spirit grown that there was then little fear of, or respect for, 
the government in the Illinois Country. Trade that should 



GOVERNMENT OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY 153 

come to Americans was being diverted to the English and 
to the Spanish. Even the law of 1791, confirming the land 
titles of the settlers, had never been executed. 

On March 20 a bill for the division of the territory was 
reported to the House. The only objection was, that it 
would cause unnecessary expense. This was overcome by 
Mr. Harrison in a spirited argument March 28, assisted by 
a timely petition from the Illinois Country. The bill passed 
the House on the twenty-eighth. 

The Senate substituted a bill providing for a slightly dif- 
ferent boundary. The House refused to accept the substi- 
tute and the Senate voted to stand by its own bill. Seeing 
that the Senate was determined Mr. Harrison and his 
friends decided to recede and the Senate bill became a law 
May 3. Two of Mr. Harrison's measures were thus carried 
at the same time ; for the chief trouble with the courts had 
been the inability of the judges to travel from county to 
county.-^ 

Meanwhile Harrison was busy with the land laws. No 
other question interested the common people of the terri- 
tory so much. February 24, 1800, the House, in committee 
of the v/hole, took up the report on the sale of public lands. 
A bill was drawn providing that townships be divided, and 
that lots of three hundred and twenty acres each be offered 
for sale at two dollars per acre, with the privilege of paying 
in easy installments without interest. Rights of pre-emp- 
tion were allowed, men who would establish grist mills were 
favored, land offices were to be located at convenient places, 
and the whole attitude of the government toward the settler 
reversed. The bill became a law and Harrison was justly 
proud of his work in Congress.^^ 

These successes make one feel that the nation lost a 
great statesman when he resigned. His ancestry and train- 
ing gave him standing in the east, while his experience on 
the frontier enabled him to understand and appreciate the 
west. The laws he secured are worthy of the first delegate 
from the territory. 

29 See Annals of Coiu/rcss under dates indicated. For the law see 
United States Stntntcs at Large, Sixth Cong. Sess. I, cli. 41. 

30 United States Statutes at Large, y^ixth Congress, First Sess., ch. 55. 



CHAPTER VII 
indiana territory, 1800-1816 

§ 29 Organization of Indiana Territory : First Grade 

The eastern boundary of the new territory was a line 
beginning opposite the mouth of Kentucky river and run- 
ning thence to Fort Recovery and from that point due 
north to Canada. The disagreement between the House 
and Senate on the bill for separation had been over this 
boundary. The House favored the line due north from the 
mouth of the Big Miami, and the Senate favored the line 
given above. The reason for the action of the Senate was 
that the land was open for settlement only as far west as the 
Greenville boundary line, which ran from Fort Recovery to 
the mouth of Kentucky river. To make the western bound- 
ary of Ohio a line due north from the mouth of the Big 
Miami would leave the settlers in this wedge — the gore — 
practically without government, since their capital would 
be at Vincennes. As bounded by the Senate bill, there 
would be no public land for sale in the new territory, and 
so the expense of government could be kept at a minimum 
until Ohio should become a State. The southern boundary 
of the territory was the Ohio river, the western was the 
Mississippi river, and the northern the Dominion of Cana- 
da. The capital was to be at Vincennes, and the territorial 
government in all essentials the same as that described 
above for the Northwestern Territory. 

The act of separation was to take effect July 4, 1800. It 
was necessary, then, that active measures be taken at once 
to constitute the new government. President John Adams 
already had his mind made up when the organizing act was 
passed concerning the officers, and, on the Tuesday follow- 
ing the signing of the bill, he nominated Harrison for gover- 



INDIANA TERRITORY 155 

nor. The position was not very attractive. Life at the 
frontier posts even today is considered tedious and it was 
far worse then. Besides, there was scarcely a western post 
at that time with a reputation as objectionable as that of 
Vincennes. Its location away from the main lines of travel, 
the difficulty of reaching it, its notoriety for scenes of 
drunken brawls and Indian fights, made Harrison hesitate 
before accepting the position. For territorial secretary the 
President chose John Gibson, and for judges he chose Wil- 
liam Clark, Henry Vanderburg and John Griffin. 

The census of 1800 gave to Indiana Territory a popula- 
tion of 6,550. These were fairly well distributed over the 
country. In Clark's Grant, known at that time as the Illi- 
nois Grant, at the Falls of the Ohio, were 929 settlers. In 
and around Vincennes there were 2,497, including 50 trad- 
ers on the Wabash and 28 colored persons held as slaves. In 
and around Kaskaskia, separated from Vincennes by 200 
miles of forest and prairie traversed by a single trail, were 
1,103 persons, including the little settlement of 90 persons 
down at Fort Massac, on the Ohio. In and around Cahokia, 
100 miles up the Mississippi river from Kaskaskia, there 
were 1,255 settlers. These four settlements were all well 
ordered pioneer communities. 

Besides these there were 251 inhabitants at Michillimaci- 
nac, on the channel that joins Lakes Michigan and Huron, 
700 miles from any of the other settlements. At Prairie du 
Chien, 600 miles up the Mississippi from Kaskaskia, were 
65 traders and settlers. On Green Bay, 200 miles west of 
Michillimacinac, was a population of 50. At Peoria, on the 
Illinois river, were 100 settlers ; and 300 were enumerated 
under the heading "boatmen from Canada," the familiar 
coureurs du hois of the fur trade. ^ 

Harrison did not arrive at the Indiana capital till Janu- 
ary 10, 1801. In his absence the government devolved on 
the secretary, John Gibson. Whether he had any instruc- 
tions from the governor does not appear, but at any rate 
Secretary Gibson proceeded, immediately upon his arrival, 
July 22, 1800, to set up the new government. He appointed 

1 Census of ISOO: Dunn. Iiididini. iDo. 



156 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

justices for the various courts, clerks, a sheriff, a justice of 
the peace, a treasurer, and a recorder. On August 1 the 
work of organizing the militia was taken up and a full corps 
of officers appointed. At the same time appointments were 
filled out for the civil officers of St. Clair county. 

As soon as the governor arrived at Vincennes he sum- 
moned the judges to meet January 12, for the purpose of 
enacting such laws as were necessary. During this period a 
practice grew up that later caused serious criticism of the 
governor. An illustration will make it plain. John Gibson 
was secretary of the territory. He was appointed a justice 
of the peace February 1. February 3 he was made county 
recorder of Knox county; February 4 he was made a judge 
of the quarter sessions court. No doubt there was a lack of 
good men to fill these responsible offices, but the American 
people have never accepted the idea of an office-holding 
class. Especially has such a class been unpopular among 
the western people. - 

In that part of the Northwest Territory set oif as In- 
diana Territory there were two counties already organized 
in 1800. The oldest of these was St. Clair, organized by and 
named for, Governor St. Clair, April 27, 1790. Knox county 
had been organized by Secretary Winthrop Sargent June 
20, 1790. Wayne county had been organized by Governor 
St. Clair August 15, 1796. It included northern Ohio. 
Indiana north of a line from Fort Wayne to the south end of 
Lake Michigan, a small part of Illinois, eastern Wisconsin, 
and all of Michigan. The county seat, however, was at De- 
troit, which, w^th nearly all the settled part of the county, 
remained in the Northwest Territory by the division of 
1800. 

The Ohio Enabling Act, April 30, 1802, laid down the 
present northern boundary of Ohio and attached that part 
of old Wayne county north of the Ohio line to Indiana Terri- 

- The best authority for this period is the Excvutive Journal of In- 
diana Territory. This is preserved in tlie office of the vSecret;iry of 
State ;tt Iiifliaiij'.polis. It is published in Vol. Ill, Puhlications of In- 
diana Historical Society; see also Homer J. Webster, William Henry 
Harrison's Administration of Indiana Territory. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 157 

tory. By proclamation of January 24, 1803, a new Wayne 
county was created, bounded on the west by a meridian, 
tangent to the western shore of Lake Michigan, on the south 
by a parallel, tangent to the southern point of Lake Michi- 
gan, and on the east and north by Canada. 

The Ohio Enabling Act also detached from Ohio a wedge 
shaped territory on its western border, bounded by a merid- 
ian through the mouth of the Big Miami, the Greenville 
Treaty line from Fort Recovery to the mouth of the Ken- 
tucky river and the Ohio river. This strip, usually known 
as the "Gore," by proclamation of Governor Harrison was, 
for purposes of government, attached to Clark county. 

March 26, 1804, the Louisiana Purchase was divided, and 
that part north of the thirty-third parallel was placed under 
the jurisdiction of the governor and judges of Indiana Terri- 
tory. The district, however, was never a part of Indiana 
Territory. Laws had to be enacted for the new district the 
same as for a separate territory. It was governed under 
an ordinance very different from that of 1787, which con- 
trolled Indiana. The act that placed it for reasons of econ- 
omy under these officers was to be in force for only one year 
following October 1, 1804.^ 

When Governor Harrison reorganized old Wayne county 
he asked all the officers to continue in office as they had under 
the Northwest Territory. There was no complaint of un- 
fairness against the government at Vincennes, yet there 
was manifested by the inhabitants of Detroit a restlessness 
that soon found expression in a petition for separation. 

A memorial, asking for a separate government, signed 
by Joseph Harrison and others, was presented to the first 
session of the Eighth Congress. A Senate committee re- 
ported favorably, giving as its reasons: that Michigan had 
3,972 people ; that it was separated from Vincennes by over 
300 miles of wilderness ; that Detroit being exposed to both 
English and Indians ought to be provided with an efficient 
government. A bill for separation passed the Senate De- 
cember 6, 1803, but was lost in the House of Representa- 

3 United States Statutes at Large, Eighth Cong.. First Sess., ch. 3S. 



158 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

tives, where it was objected to on account of expense in- 
volved. 

The inhabitants of Detroit were encouraged by the vote 
of the Senate, and, when Congress met again petitions for 
separation were presented in each house. Again the Senate 
was favorable and the House of Representatives, influenced 
by a resolution from the Indiana Legislature, was opposed, 
regarding a separate government as a needless expense. In 
spite of this objection the House of Representatives finally' 
passed the bill and it became a law January 11, 1805. In- 
diana Territory thus lost about one-third of its area.^ 

Scarcely had the settlers of Detroit secured a home gov- 
ernment before the settlers of Kaskaskia and Cahokia peti- 
tioned Congress for a like favor. They pleaded the same 
conditions as those that had prevailed at Detroit. A vast 
expanse of wilderness separated them from the capital at 
Vincennes. The power and influence of the Vincennes gov- 
ernment was almost a nullity by the time it reached Illinois. 
The present conditions were driving settlers out of the 
country while a firm government would increase immigra- 
tion and thereby stimulate land sales. There were 28,000 
people in Indiana and over 2,700 men of voting age in Illi- 
nois. 

Political conditions also laj^ back of some of the agitation. 
The people in the eastern part of Indiana favored the sep- 
aration, because they thought it would aid them in repealing 
an odious law permitting slavery, which had been recently 
enacted by the Territorial Legislature. They also hoped that 
when Randolph and St. Clair counties were out of the terri- 
tory they could change the Indiana capital to some point 
more accessible than Vincennes. The Indiana legislature, 
by a resolution of October, 1808, favored separation on ac- 
count of the lawlessness then existing in Illinois. On the 
other hand, Randolph county, in Illinois, opposed the sep- 
aration because it would increase its taxes. 

The act of separation was signed by President Thomas 
Jefferson February 3, 1809. The two territories were di- 
vided by the Wabash river from its mouth to Vincennes, 

-i United ^^t(ltes Sfatiitcs at lAtnjc. EUilith Coini.. scks. \\, eh. 5. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 159 

thence by a meridian line to Canada. Two more changes in 
boundary were made in the Enabling Act in 1816, but they 
did not affect territorial government."- 

In 1800 all of what is now Indiana except the "Gore" 
was included in the county of Knox. It was soon found 
necessary to erect a new county over on the Ohio river. The 
new county was named Clark, after the conqueror of the 
Northwest, and proclaimed by Governor Harrison Feb- 
ruary 3, 1801. It was bounded on the west by Blue river 
up to the Vincennes Trail and from there by a meridian line 
to Driftwood Fork of White river. On the north, the 
boundary was that branch of White river which runs to- 
wards Fort Recovery and from the head spring by a direct 
line to the Fort. On the east it was bounded by the Green- 
ville Treaty line, and on the south by the Ohio river. The 
governor directed that the first court be held at Springville. 

The Ohio Enabling Act, April 30, 1802, put the settlers 
of the Whitewater Valley in Indiana. They were at first 
placed in Clark county, but were not satisfied. The county 
seat was down at the Falls, which they thought too incon- 
venient. To accommodate these settlers the governor erect- 
ed the "Gore" into a new county by a proclamation dated 
March 7, 1803. The county seat was located at Lawrence- 
burg. This county was increasing in population rapidly. 
The only public lands in the territory for sale were in this 
county.® 

§ 30 Indiana Made a Territory of the Second Grade 

Petitions for a change to a representative government 
began to reach the governor during the summer of 1804. 
The act organizing the territory gave the inhabitants the 
privilege of forming a legislative assembly whenever they 
desired. There had been some demand for the change ever 
since the organization but the men urging it Avere n-^t al- 

5 Annals, 'Ninth Confj.. /S'ceo/a? Sess., 590. The Couuiilttee reports 
are given in American State Papers. Misc.. I, 945. 

6 New counties were created by proclamation of tlie governor. Tlie 
proclamation will be fomid in tbe Exccvtine Journal under the date 
given in the text above. 



160 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ways sincere. They had favored or opposed the change 
from the standpoint of their own personal interest. 

Ever since Clark's Conquest, office-holding had been an 
attractive occupation in the Illinois and Wabash countries. 
For ten years dishonest men had had control and called 
their system of plunder a government. So grievous had been 
their rule that the French had petitioned to be relieved of 
free government and placed under an absolute commandant 
again. While Hamtramck commanded at Fort Knox these 
men were held in check, but when he left they again resumed 
their old practices. 

The arrival of Harrison was awaited in fear by these 
men. Their fears were justified, for they soon learned that 
he came to govern. Some of the better men of this clique 
received offices from him, in which they rendered faithful 
service. The others formed an opposition which attacked 
the Harrison administration at every opportunity. As early 
as 1801 these malcontents were trying to create a party in 
favor of a representative government. They succeeded in 
arousing some interest, both at Vincennes and in Illinois, 
Harrison opposed the change at this time, but in 1804 he 
favored it. 

The territory had made great progress in the three years. 
There was not much grovvi:h in wealth and population, but 
there was great progress otherwise. In 1801 the entire 
north bank of the Ohio river from the Greenville line to the 
mouth of the river was Indian land, except Clark's Grant. 
There was not an acre of government land for sale in the 
territory. By 1805 government land offices had been opened 
at Vincennes and Kaskaskia and an amount of land equal to 
the present area of Indiana was being surveyed and offered 
for sale to settlers. Immigrants were already crowding into 
the newly opened lands. A line of settlements and villages 
dotted the north bank of the Ohio from Lawrenceburg to 
Evansville, while clusters of settlements were already lo- 
cated high up the Whitewater, White and Wabash ri*. ers. 

As soon as Harrison was satisfied that there was a real 
demand for a representative government he ordered the 
sheriffs to hold elections in the various count'es. The proc- 



INDIANA TERRITORY 161 

lamation was given to the sheriffs August 4, and the elec- 
tion was set for September 11, 1804. 

By December 5 returns were in from all counties except 
Wayne — Detroit. The proclamation did not reach this coun- 
ty in time to hold the election. Only four hundred votes were 
cast in the whole territory. Either the time or place of 
election was unknown in the distant counties or the people 
were not sufficiently interested to go to the polls. It was a 
busy time of the year for farmers, and the voting places were 
at the county seats, often from ten to fifty miles distant from 
the homes of many voters. Under the circumstances it is 
not surprising that only those in and near the county seats 
should vote. 

It is impossible to see any great significance in the vote. 
No one has questioned the interpretation which the gover- 
nor placed upon it, that the people desired to pass to the rep- 
resentative stage of government, but some have tried to 
show that it was an expression on the slavery question. 
Randolph county, with thirty-four slaves, cast forty votes 
for the change and twenty-one against it. St. Clair county, 
with more slaves, cast fifty-nine votes against it and twenty- 
two in favor. Of the one hundred and seventy-five votes cast 
in Knox county all were in favor except twelve. This 
argues certainly that the governor gave his active influence 
in favor of the change. Dearborn county, still resenting the 
act that separated her from the State of Ohio and attached 
her to an unwieldy territory whose capital could hardly be 
found in the backwoods, gave her unanimous vote, only 
twenty-six, against the change. Clark county, which had 
led in the anti-slavery fight, favored the change by a vote of 
thirty-five to thirteen. The only possible significance is, that 
the distant counties opposed and the near ones favored. 

The vote favored the change in government by a major- 
ity of one hundred and thirty-eight, and on the strength of 
this majority. Governor Harrison proclaimed the change 
December 5, 1804, thus ending the absolute rule of the gov- 
ernor and judges."^ 

Governor Harrison was one of the best territorial gov- 

'^ Executive Jotinuil. under given dates. 



162 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ernors ever sent out by the United States. Having come west 
in early manhood his tastes and ideals were v^estern. His 
education and training raised him above the ordinary pio- 
neer. He avoided the Puritanic, Federalistic, infallible man- 
ner of Governor St. Clair, v^ithout falling into the opposite, 
hail-fellow manner of the low politician. His services in the 
army further cultivated his naturally generous nature. His 
marriage with the daughter of Judge Symmes brought him 
a competence and removed him from the temptations to 
land- jobbing and defrauding the Indians, practices which 
have disgraced our territorial governments. Possessing al-. 
most military power, he never violated the expressed opinion 
of his constituents. 

Governor Harrison's duties kept him away from Vin- 
cennes a large part of the time. In his absence the duties 
of the office fell chiefly on his secretary, John Gibson. The 
latter was a Pennsylvanian by birth, and, at the time of his 
appointment, was a veteran of sixty years. In the matter of 
training and experience he was well prepared for the duties 
of this backwoods post. He had served under Forbes at the 
capture of Fort Duquesne and under Governor Dunmore at 
the battle of Point Pleasant. During the Revolution he 
served with Washington. He had been commander of the 
Pennsylvania militia, had been a fur trader at Pittsburg for 
several years, and for a long period had lived among the 
Indians, becoming by marriage a brother-in-law to the elo- 
quent Logan, chief of the Mingoes. "The Journal of the 
Proceedings of the Executive Government of the Indian Ter- 
ritory," kept by Gibson, is the best record we have of terri- 
torial Indiana. 

From the battle of Tippecanoe, November, 1811, to May, 
1813, Gibson was acting-governor. At the last date he gave 
way to Gen. Thomas Posey, a companion in arms, and, at 
the time, a United States senator from Louisiana. Posey 
had been a soldier all his life, serving under Lord Dunmore 
against the Indians, as a colonel, during the Revolution, and 
with Wayne in the Maumee campaign against the north- 
western Indians. He was a Virginian by birth and would 
have moved to the Northwest Territory had not the law for- 



INDIANA TERRITORY 163 

bidden slavery. He served as governor of Indiana until the 
territory became a State in 1816.^ 

Governor Harrison's duties as superintendent of Indian 
affairs occupied the larger part of his time. It was the 
policy of the national government, and the almost unani- 
mous desire of the western people that the public lands be 
opened to settlement. It is not to the discredit of the gov- 
ernor that the work of driving the Indians from the public 
domain in Indiana fell upon him. By a series of treaties, — 
the first at Vincennes, September 17, 1802, the second at 
Fort V/ayne, June 7, 1803, the third at Vincennes, August 
13, 1803, the fourth at Vincennes, August 18, 1804, the fifth 
at St. Louis, November 3, 1804, the sixth at Grouseland, near 
Vincennes, August 21, 1805, the seventh at Vincennes, De- 
cember 30, 1805, the eighth at Fort Wayne, September 30, 
1809, — the governor succeeded in freeing most of the land 
in the territory south of the site of Indianapolis from In- 
dian claims. A reading of the long, meaningless speeches of 
the Indian orators, of the ceremonies and formalities of one 
of these conventions, will give an idea of the time, tact and 
patience spent in negotiations with the Indians. 

As superintendent of Indian affairs it was his duty to 
regulate the trade with the natives. For this purpose he 
required each trader to take out a license designating the 
locality where he intended to trade. On account of the need 
of money in the territorial treasury. Governor Harrison 
asked permission to charge a fee for each license, but Con- 
gress refused on the ground that the taxing power properly 
belonged to the legislature. A list of these traders is given 
in another chapter. 

The liquor traffic with the Indians was most troublesome. 
Less than six months after his arrival, the governor issued 
a proclamation forbidding any trader to sell liquor to the 
Indians in Vincennes. If the trader sold it at all, he must 
deliver it to the buyer at least one mile from town, or on the 
west side of the Wabash. The common thing with the 
trader was to lure the Indians to town, away from his 

SHeitiiiiin. Historical Register of Officers of the Continentnl Anuii, 
333. 



164 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

friends, make him drunk, and rob him. In an effort at 
revenge the Indian usually committed some petty crime — an 
assault on some white man, destruction of property, such as 
killing hogs, burning fences or buildings, — which brought 
him within the reach of the law. But no law has ever 
regulated the liquor traffic. Driven from Vincennes, the 
traders, usually the most debased people on the frontier, 
next attempted to continue the whiskey traffic by visiting the 
Indians in their hunting camps, where there were ordi- 
narily only two or three men with their families. These were 
soon made drunk, and, under color of trade, robbed of their 
furs. August 31, 1801, the governor also forbade this and 
ordered all traders who violated the order to be arrested and 
their goods seized. 

In memorials to the President, the governor pleaded for 
some effective means of arresting the whiskey plague among 
the Indians. His language in these memorials leaves no 
doubt as to the ravages of liquor among the savages. In a 
message to the first General Assembly he asked for authority 
to stop what he termed a "dreadful conflagration spreading 
misery and desolation" and threatening the ruin of the en- 
tire race. The first law passed by an Indiana legislature 
was a law regulating and restricting the sale of liquor to 
the Indians. Tecumseh and the Prophet both opposed the 
use of whiskey by their tribesmen, but the curse was not 
to be stayed by either white man or red. It went on until it 
inflamed the anger of the red men to the war point, and, 
more than all other causes, hindered their civilization.^ 

The next in importance of the governor's duties, and 
closely connected with his duties as superintendent of In- 
dian affairs, was providing for the defense of the settler. 
The militia law of the Northwest Territory had been in 

9 Dawson's Life of Harrison. 73, .scq. This wns written in 1S24 by 
jMoses Pnwson. editoi* of the Cincinnati Adrcrtif^er, ancl a warm personal 
friend of Harrison. The documents, whioli compose the larj2:er part of 
volume, were furnished by Harrison. It is the most satisfactory treatise 
on the military life of the general. See also Lairs of Indiana Territorji. 
1S01-180G, reprinted by Throop and Clark. Paoli. Indiana, 18.S6 : also 
Executive Journal of Indiana Territory ; see also a History of the IjOte 
War. by an American, published at Baltimore, 181G. It is very rare. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 165 

force at Vincennes ten years before the arrival of Harrison. 
This old system was completely reorganized by the act of 
December 13, 1799, which became the law for Indiana Ter- 
ritory. The Indiana territorial legislature December 5, 
1806, amended it enough to make it conform to new condi- 
tions. 

By this law every able-bodied citizen between the ages 
of eighteen and forty-five, except preachers and territorial 
officers, was required, within twenty days after settling in 
the county, to enroll with the captain of the company com- 
manding his district. Moreover, he was required to provide 
himself with musket, bayonet, two extra flints, knapsack, 
and pouch with twenty-four cartridges, twenty balls, and 
one-fourth pound of powder. All these but the knapsack 
must be brought to muster. 

The militia were divided into divisions, brigades, regi- 
ments, battalions, and companies. These were all numbered 
and mustered according to number. A full company was 
regularly composed of sixty-four privates, though it could 
have any number between forty and eighty. Four com- 
panies were placed together to make a battalion ; two bat- 
talions constituted a regiment; two to four regiments 
formed a brigade; and two brigades united to make a di- 
vision. 

The commander of a division ranked as a major-general, 
and his staff as majors ; the commanders of brigades were 
brigadier-generals; the commanders of regiments had the 
awkward legal title of lieutenant-colonels-commandants, but 
were in common parlance always called colonels. The bat- 
talions were always led by majors and the companies by 
captains. Besides its captain, each company had a lieuten- 
ant, an ensign, four sergeants, four corporals, one drummer, 
and a fifer. In addition to the field officers, there were an 
adjutant-general, who kept the records, made inspections 
and did other clerical work, a judge-advocate, orderlies, and 
a commissary officer. 

From each battalion there was chosen a company of 
active young men between the ages of eighteen and twenty- 
eight, who drilled often and made all the lighter campaigns. 
These companies were variously called grenadiers, light in- 

(12) 



166 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

fantry, or riflemen. From each brigade there was chosen 
a company of artillery, to consist of one captain, two lieu- 
tenants, four sergeants, four corporals, six gunners, six 
bombardiers, one drummer, one fifer, and from twenty to 
thirty matrosses armed with fusees and twelve rounds of 
ammunition. From each brigade there was chosen a troop 
of horse, consisting of thirty to sixty privates with com- 
pany officers. Each had to equip himself with horse, sad- 
dle, bridle, saddlebags, boots and spurs, sabre, and a brace 
of pistols with ammunition. Each militiaman, of whatever 
rank, provided his own uniform according to official regu- 
lations. 

Each county was supposed to furnish enough troops to 
organize a regiment. The regimental officers divided the 
county into districts, each of which furnished a company. 
If a district became too populous the county was redistricted 
and a new company formed. Each company of light troops 
mustered every two months, except in the winter. The 
battalion muster was held in April and the regimental mus- 
ter in October. 

The musters occupied a single day, during which the 
troops were supposed to be under arms six hours. The roll 
call and inspection took place at 11:30 a. m. A system of 
fines, ranging from six dollars for a private to one hundred 
dollars for an officer, enforced attendance. The field offi- 
cers were called together much oftener for drill and instruc- 
tions. The manual of tactics prepared by Baron Steuben 
was the text book for this discipline. 

The governor could call out the militia whenever he saw 
fit. It was provided by law that the various companies 
serve in turn but in an emergency the governor called out 
those nearest, even though they had just returned from 
service. 

Muster days were the chief social occasions for the 
neighborhood. The families of the men attended, a dinner, 
preferably a barbecue, being served. The younger folks 
spent the day in dancing, while the elders of the community 
talked over affairs of common interest, usually politics. If 
there were any candidates, and there nearly always were. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 167 

as elections occurred annually, they were busy on the 
ground. The effects of this militia law are noticeable in our 
history long after the law itself had fallen into disuse. 

Next in importance to the executive in the territorial 
government was the supreme court. This was composed of 
three judges, first of whom were William Clark, Henry Van- 
derburg and John Griffin. Clark died in 1802 and was suc- 
ceeded by Thomas Terry Davis. Their work, as has been 
shown before, was difficult, and their support by the people 
doubtful. The pioneers did not share fully in that rever- 
ence for courts which is generally found among English- 
men. The delays and expenses of procedure often wore out 
their patience, causing them to take the law into their own 
hands. This mob spirit was oftenest shown against horse- 
thieves — the most hateful of pioneer criminals — many of 
whom were taken from the jails and hung. 

The judges, together with the governor under the first 
grade, had constituted the law-making body of the territory. 
As a legislature they sat three times. The first session was 
from January 12 to January 26, 1801. Ten laws and reso- 
lutions were enacted. One year later, January 28 to Febru- 
ary 3, 1802, they met and enacted two laws. A third session 
closed March 24, 1803, after passing a law and a resolution. 
All of these laws were of the most routine kind, providing 
for raising revenue, directing the practices of courts and 
lawyers, regulating ferries and lawyer's fees.^" 

Besides their law-making duties the territorial judges 
sat at Vincennes as a court of appeal. In this capacity they 
were a final resort in all cases at law. 

They also sat at Vincennes on the first Tuesdays of 
March and September as a general court of record, whose 
writs ran in the name of the United States, and which had 
cognizance of all capital cases. These cases were tried in 
the county where the crime was committed, and for this 
purpose the judges had to go on circuit. 

This circuit court was the chief court of the county. 
Upon it fell the burden of upholding the power of the gov- 
ernment and teaching the people its supreme value. At its 

^'^ Laics of Indiana Tcnitori/. passim. 



168 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bar could be heard the speeches of the great lawyers who 
rode the circuit with the territorial judges, who, alone, 
could hold circuit court. 

The courts described above were general or territorial 
courts. Below these were the county courts. Chief of these 
was the court of quarter sessions, which met at Vincennes. 
for Knox county, on the first Tuesdays of February, May, 
August and November. Three justices, one being of the 
quorum, held these courts and tried petty crimes and mis- 
demeanors. , 

Co-ordinate with the quarter sessions was the common 
pleas court. This, also, was a court of record and met four 
times annually at the same time and place as the quarter 
sessions. The same justices presided over both courts us- 
ually. Fines and costs assessed by these courts could be 
transferred to the oyer and terminer, or circuit court, and 
collected by the sheriff. The common pleas justices con- 
trolled the grand juries, and certified felonies to the higher 
courts for trial. 

The county government under the judges was a simple 
form of the commissioner system. The township constable 
listed property, the commissioners levied the taxes, the treas- 
urer received and disbursed the money. The general super- 
visory power of the judges remained the same as under the 
Northwest Territory, The sheriff was at the head of the 
county administration, though the coroner was an officer of 
importance. A county clerk and county recorder performed 
substantially the same duties as they do today. 

Little record has come down to us of township govern- 
ment. The county judges were empowered to divide the 
counties, but justices were commissioned for the whole 
county. The constables, in listing property, were to observe 
township lines, but in the law of January 19, 1801, no men- 
tion is made of assessors to represent the townships in the 
meetings of the county board. This law assumed, however, 
that all counties were divided into townships. 

The people took little part or interest in the territorial 
government during the period of the first grade. This was 
necessarily so. Had local self-government been imposed on 



INDIANA TERRITORY 169 

the early settlers it would have been a grievous hardship. 
They were engaged in a struggle that demanded all their 
time and resources. The first grade was a military govern- 
ment pure and simple. It was extended to the people of 
Indiana as a favor and not imposed as a restriction. The 
people were given the right, by the act organizing the terri- 
tory, to assume the burdens of government as soon as they 
pleased, regardless of their numbers and the limitations set 
by the Ordinance of 1787. 

It is not to be expected, therefore, that any scientific 
theory of government was applied. The scanty population, 
composed of widely different groups, separated by hundreds 
of miles of wilderness, could not be united under one effect' 
ive administration. Harrison's early administration was a 
temporary rule to protect the pioneers until such time as 
they should be able to assume the duties of self-government. 
There was no question of the prevalence of the New England 
plan or the Virginia plan of local government. A majority 
of the settlers of Indiana during its territorial days came 
immediately from the South, but it does not follow that 
they therefore reestablished southern institutions. It has 
been assumed by some writers that where the township is 
there the Puritan has been. The assumption is unwarranted. 
The township in some form has come wherever compact set- 
tlements of Englishmen have been made. And where these 
same people, in sparsely settled communities, have had no 
need for that expensive form of government they have es- 
tablished a county system. Expediency was the light that 
guided them. Officers have been chosen, and invested with 
power as social conditions made their services seem neces- 
sary. 

§ 31 The Territorial Legislature 

The territorial legislature consisted of two houses, a 
House of Representatives and a Council. The House of Rep- 
resentatives was composed of the following seven men 
elected by the voters of the counties : Jesse B. Thomas, of 
Dearborn ; Davis Floyd, of Clark ; Benjamin Park and John 
Johnson, of Knox; Dr. George Fisher, of Randolph; Shad- 



170 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

rack Bond and William Biggs, of St. Clair county. These 
men nominated ten candidates from whom President Jef- 
ferson was to select five to constitute the Council. Jefferson 
requested Governor Harrison to choose the members of the 
Council, and he selected Benjamin Chambers, founder of 
Lawrenceburg, from Dearborn; Samuel Gwathmey, one of 
the trustees of Jeff ersonville, from Clark ; John Rice Jones, 
of Knox ; Pierre Menard, the best known of the Illinois fur 
traders, from Randolph, and John Hay, also a fur trader, 
from St. Clair. 

These were representative men. There were several im- 
portant questions before the people at this time. The slavery 
question, manhood suffrage, regulation of the salt wells, and 
a modification of the land laws. These were all subjects for 
congressional legislation. Benjamin Parke was selected by 
the legislature to represent the territory in Congress and 
instructed to urge favorable action on these subjects. 

There was plenty of work confronting the new legisla- 
ture which met July 29, 1805. The criminal law had to be 
reformed to meet local vices. The frontier has always been 
the rendezvous of criminals, and the scene of much crime. 
Horse stealing was the most common as well as the most ag- 
gravating crime. The impossibility of protecting horses 
from thieves, the rapidity with which the horses could be 
made away with, the difficulty of overtaking them, the abso- 
lute necessity of horses to the pioneer farmer, and the con- 
sequent ease with which they could be sold, have made them 
a tempting mark for the thief in all countries. The theft of 
a horse might prevent a farmer from planting a crop. A 
law was soon passed punishing the horsethief with two hun- 
dred lashes and imprisonment until the horse was paid for, 
for the first offense, and with death for the second. 

There were some other forms of stealing that were com- 
mon. Hogs and cattle ran at large. Hogs, especially, were 
almost wild. Their owners paid little attention to them, 
further than to feed them during the last weeks of winter 
and mark the pigs at weaning time. The hog thief either 
marked the young pigs before the owner could, changed the 
mark after it was made, or killed the grown hogs regardless 



INDIANA TERRITORY 171 

of marks. A fine of from $50 to $100 and twenty-five to 
thirty-nine lashes well laid on the bare back, was the pen- 
alty imposed by the legislature for this crime. 

Society was rough and boisterous, and, in Territorial 
Indiana, church and tavern were the two congregating 
places. One of these was the resort of the orderly class, the 
other the resort of the disorderly. The two extremes of 
society were the border ruffian and the border preacher. 
They were uncompromising enemies. The circuit rider was 
just as game for a fight as the rowdy. His meetings were 
often disturbed by the neighborhood bravoes. Every new 
preacher in the neighborhood had to establish his reputation 
with those characters who attempted to break up his meet- 
ings. It is to the credit of our earliest law-makers that they 
put the law on the side of the preachers, where its weight 
counted for order and decency. Disorderly conduct, espe- 
cially profanity, was punishable by fine, and, if that was not 
promptly paid, the offender was jailed. 

Gambling and drunkenness were the common things 
among the lawless element at the taverns, though these were 
often the prelude to more serious crime. The ordinary 
gambler carried on his trade by means of a greasy pack of 
cards and draw poker. The dandy played billiards. Both 
as a tax measure and a police regulation the legislature put 
the tavern under the supervision of the county common 
pleas justices. The judges issued a license which cost the 
applicant $12 ; and they also made out a schedule of rates 
which were certified by the county clerk and posted in the 
tavern lobby. If the tavern keeper or any one else kept a 
billiard table he was required to pay an annual fee of $50. 
This was bad legislation, for it necessitated the tavern going 
into politics, and made crime profitable to the taxpayer. 

The courts, then even more than now, were hide-bound 
by precedents and technicalities. Juries, under the influence 
of eloquent lawyers, were disposed to do substantial justice. 
But there were plenty of pettyfogging shysters who took 
advantage of the technicalities and delays of the law to rob 
the unwary or evade justice. Under the slow process of the 
common law, and the tardy action of the regular courts, any 



172 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

one threatened with a suit could gather up his effects and 
leave the State before the law could lay hands on him. Evil- 
doers could thus accomplish their purpose and leave the 
State, unrestrained. To remedy this a chancery court was 
provided for. It had power to enjoin a wrongdoer or issue a 
writ of ne exeat forbidding him to leave its jurisdiction. 
This court proved useless. A statute of more value was one 
consolidating the common pleas, quarter sessions, orphans 
and probate courts into a single court called the county 
common pleas. The practice was simplified also at this 
time. 

In the way of commercial development little was at- 
tempted. Each county court was required to get a set of 
standard weights and measures for the use of the people. A 
strict road law was enacted, requiring every man to work at 
least twelve days annually under supervisors appointed by 
the county courts. Millers were given the right of eminent 
domain in locating their dam sites. The toll of the miller 
was fixed by law, and he was required to grind "well and 
suflficiently and in turn." Sealed toll dishes and struck meas- 
ures were required. 

The law-makers had no consistent view of personal 
rights. On the one hand, they provided a way by which all 
persons imprisoned for debt might liberate themselves, and 
a way by which the accused might give bail, and a way by 
Vv^hich orphans might be protected and cared for. All these 
tended to better the condition of the unfortunate. On the 
other hand, they enacted a law permitting indentured ap- 
prenticeship of boys and girls till the ages of twenty-one and 
eighteen, respectively. Another law concerning the intro- 
duction of negroes was not substantially different from the 
Virginia slave code, and finds no justification except in 
human slavery. It did little harm, few negroes ever being 
brought into the State, nevertheless it is the most infamous 
law ever placed on the Indiana statute book. 

The meeting of the legislature brought out distinctly the 
various factions among the settlers. It was well understood 
from the language of the Ordinance of 1787 that the con- 
nection between Indiana and Illinois was only temporary. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 173 

The Illinois settlements were all on the Mississippi. Their 
maricet was New Orleans. There was no inducement for 
them to come to Vincennes except to attend court or per- 
form other governmental duties. The level prairies of Illi- 
nois were covered with water in winter, in summer none 
could be had, not even to drink. The trip by land or water 
was long and tiresome. The Illinois settlers were called upon 
to pay two-fifths of the expense of a government, which 
could neither protect their homes from the Indians, nor their 
commerce from the Spanish buccaneers. 

There was dissatisfaction also in the Whitewater Valley. 
Hardly had the first Indiana legislators returned home until 
a petition was in circulation asking Congress to reannex the 
"Gore" to Ohio, where it had formerly belonged. Most of 
the settlers at that time traded at Cincinnati, and their 
sympathies were with the people of Ohio. Especially was 
the indenture law, enacted by the late Indiana legislature, 
distasteful to them. For these reasons, and on account of 
the great distance to, and inconvenient location of Vin- 
cennes, one hundred and five of the settlers joined in this 
petition to be taken from Indiana and attached to Ohio.^' 

The French inhabitants also protested against the new 
government. The levy of a territorial tax, especially the poll 
tax, caused dissatisfaction everywhere. It lay at the bottom 
of the discontent in Illinois and on the Whitewater. The 
French citizens of Vincennes held a meeting August 16, 
1807, passed resolutions denouncing the change to the sec- 
ond grade, and threatened with a boycott all those who had 
favored it. 

The Ordinance of 1787 forbade slavery in the North- 
west Territory. This law had been carried out by the gov- 
ernment of that territory, but when Indiana Territory was 
organized the sentiment of its people was not opposed to 
slavery. 

Neither the governor nor the courts maintained any 
straightforward policy on the question. Slaves were held in 
all parts of Indiana Territory. A majority of the people 
thought that the repeal of the section of the Ordinance for- 

^^ American State Papers, MisccUa neons. -l.'iO: Dunn, Imlkina. 451. 



174 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bidding slavery would largely increase immigration. With 
the purpose in mind of petitioning Congress to suspend this 
part of the Ordinance, a convention was held at Vincennes 
December 20, 1802. This convention was called and pre- 
sided over by Governor Harrison. The convention seems to 
have been unanimous in its prayer for the suspension of the 
Ordinance, so far as it concerned slavery. A committee of 
the House of Representatives, of which John Randolph, a 
Virginia planter, owner of more than three hundred slaves, 
was chairman, reported against the petition. He pointed 
out in his report that Ohio was settling up rapidly without 
slaves, and that slavery was a curse to any community. 

Similar petitions were presented to Congress by the In- 
diana settlers, and by the legislature at various times, but 
Congress turned a deaf ear to their prayers. Failing in their 
petitions, the people next turned to the territorial govern- 
ment for aid in bringing in slaves. September 22, 1803, 
the governor and judges adopted a "Law Concerning Ser- 
vants" from the Virginia slave code. This allowed masters, 
expecting to come to Indiana with their slaves, to make a 
contract with them for lifelong slavery. This contract was 
salable, and by this means slaves were held, bought and sold 
in Indiana just as well as in Virginia. 

A series of such acts disgraced our territorial legisla- 
tures.^- With the separation of Indiana and Illinois and the 
growth of the settlements on the Ohio river, the anti-slavery 
sentiment gradually gained the upper hand. By 1810 the 
anti-slavery party was strong enough to repeal these pro- 
slavery laws.'-' The leaders in the anti-slavery cause were 

i~ Lairs of Indhuia Terrilorii. ISOo. ')-2~). 

13 Lans of Indiana Territory. ISIO. 54. At the date of its repeal there 
were 2.37 slaves in the state. The institution of slavery never had any 
earnest supporters in Indiana, however. Yet in spite of this it was the 
cause of factional politics throushout the territorial era. Naturally 
those persons enii?:r;',ting from the South were not bitter against slave- 
holders. The indenture law of ISOS was not an expression of the will 
of the people but rather a bit of sharp practice in the interest of a 
few politicians who no doubt were looking far into the future for 
political favors. Of these the "Dough face" representative from the 
Whitewater valley, Jesse B. Thomas, is a good example. No one will 
believe that he was representing Dearborn county when he was abetting 
pro-slavery measures in the Indiana General Assembly. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 175 

mostly of southern birth. The census of 1810 showed two 
hundred and thirty-seven slaves in the State and the number, 
no doubt, never exceeded two hundred and fifty. While most 
of these were held in the vicinity of Vincennes, there were 
slaves in all parts of the State. i-* 

Self government and struggles over the elections have 
always gone on hand in hand. Democracy is always strug- 
gling for freer expression. The first representative assem- 
bly in Indiana regulated the election of members to the Gen- 
eral Assembly. This merely applied the old law then in 
force in the Northwest Territory. A high property qualifi- 
cation prevailed at that time throughout the United States. 
This same General Assembly appointed a committee of two, 
John Rice Jones and John Johnson, two Vincennes attor- 
neys, to codify the laws. These men gave us our first elec- 
tion law — approved September 17, 1807.^'' 

This law provided that elections for representatives, the 
only officers then elected by the people in the territory, 
should be held every two years on the first Monday of April. 
Polls were to be opened at ten o'clock a. m. by the sheriff and 
two justices of the common pleas. Polls remained open two 
days, and if necessary three days. Two clerks kept the tally. 
If a man offered to vote, he was questioned by the judges as 
to his qualifications, and if permitted, he then named the 
man for whom he wished to vote, and his own name was 
written under that of his candidates. Voting was all done 
orally. Free male inhabitants, twenty-one years of age and 
possessed of fifty acres of land, could vote. 

The election for delegate to Congress was regulated by 
Congress. An act of February 27, 1809, permitted the peo- 
ple to elect the delegate at the same time they chose their 
representative. This act also gave the people the right to 
elect their own councillors. The same qualifications were 
prescribed as for the representatives. The election thus be- 
came a most important affair. 

14 J. P. Dunn. Indiana. This is a monograph on the slavery struggle 
in Indiana. Tt is an excellent piece of work. Mr. Dunn has publisliefl 
a number of slavery papers in PubJications of Indiana Historical 
Society, II. 

15 LaicH of Indiana Territory. 1807. 



176 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

A new law of Congress, March 3, 1811, gave the right 
to vote to all taxpaying men over twenty-one years of age 
who had been in the territory one year. Office holders ap- 
pointed by the governor were not allowed to be candidates. 
The State legislature, following the lead of Congress, pre- 
scribed the same qualifications, took the control of elections 
out of the hands of the sheriff, who was the friend of the 
governor, and placed it in the hands of the common pleas 
justices. Polls were to be opened in each township, instead 
of each county, by inspectors appointed by the justices. 
Written ballots were to be used. This law was signed De- 
cember 19, 1811. 

All through this period, from 1804 to 1811, there was 
outspoken hostility toward the control of the elections. The 
sheriff, who had immediate control, was appointed by the 
governor. The common pleas justices really controlled the 
sheriff, but, as the sheriff did the actual work, he got all the 
blame. The justices in turn were controlled largely by the 
tavern keepers whom they created. The influential politi- 
cians then were the sheriff's, justices and tavern keepers. 

The founders of Indiana were quick to realize the close 
dependence of free institutions on widespread education. 
"Considering that a commonwealth, where the humblest citi- 
zen may be elected to the highest public office, and where the 
heaven-born prerogative of the right to elect, and to reject, 
is retained and secured to the citizens, the knowledge which 
is requisite for a magistrate and elector, should be widely 
diffused" runs the preamble to the charter to the Vincennes 
University. This charter was granted by the Territorial 
Assembly November 29, 1806. The new institution was 
placed in the hands of a board of twenty-three trustees, in- 
cluding all the public officers of the territory and presided 
over by the governor. 

The faculty was to consist of a president and four pro- 
fessors, who were to offer instruction in the Latin, Greek, 
French and English Languages, Mathematics, Natural Phil- 
osophy, Ancient and Modern History, Moral Philosophy, 
Logic, Rhetoric, and the Law of Nature and Nations. 

The trustees were required to provide instruction for the 



INDIANA TERRITORY 177 

Indians, to establish a school for girls, as soon as funds 
would permit, to found a library, and to organize and main- 
tain a grammar school. They were further directed to 
raise the necessary funds by means of a lottery. Congress 
had previously, 1804, granted the territory a township of 
land for the use of the university. Secretary Albert Galla- 
tin had located this in Gibson county. The General Assem- 
bly authorized the board of trustees to sell not more than 
4,000 acres of this land, and lease or rent the remainder. 
The trustees asked permission of Congress to levy a small 
tax on salt for the benefit of the school, but the request was 
denied. This university continued until 1824. It had no 
adequate revenue and never flourished. ^^ 

Seminaries were chartered later at Salem, Corydon, 
Charlestown, Vevay and Vincennes. Literary societies were 
incorporated in many towns. A commendable spirit was 
shown, but, owing to the sparse population and the lack of 
funds, little real work was done in the way of public educa- 
tion. 

§ 32 Aaron Burr's Conspiracy 

During the summer and fall of 1806 the whole western 
country was thrown into excitement by the scheme of Col. 
Aaron Burr and Herrman Blannerhassett. There had been 
a certain amount of disloyal sentiment among the settlers 
west of the mountains for many years. The only ground for 
it now, since the purchase of Louisiana, was the taxes paid 
to the national government. It was pointed out to the peo- 
ple, by these plotters, that $400,000, the alleged tax paid 
each year, would go a long way toward building suitable 
roads in the Ohio Valley. 

Burr recruited his expedition of forty or fifty men 
around Pittsburg and Beaver, Pennsylvania, and picked up 
arms and provisions on his way down the Ohio. Blanner- 
hassett joined him at his island home just below Marietta. 
The whole enterprise was represented in its earlier stages 
as a trading voyage, but in Ohio and Indiana it was said to 
be a colonizing company on its way to the Red river, where 

^^ American State Papers, Miscellaneous. 654. 



178 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Burr and Blannerhassett had purchased 800,000 acres of 
land. There is little doubt that Burr and Gen. James Wil- 
kinson had planned a fillibustering, buccaneering attack on 
Mexico; 

Maj. Davis Floyd and Robert A. New were Burr's agents 
at Jeffersonville. These men collected two boat loads of men 
to join the expedition, which left Jeffersonville December 
16, 1806, in spite of the efforts of the territorial government 
to prevent it. The men were asked to bring guns and blank- 
ets and were promised eight dollars per month and a hun- 
dred acres of land on the Washita branch of the Red river. 
Mr. Burr succeeded in inducing a number of captains of 
produce boats to run their boats to Natchez, where he prom- 
ised to buy both boat and produce. 

The expedition proceeded on to Natchez, after meeting 
with some hindrance from the garrison at Fort Massac. At 
Natchez Burr was arrested and the expedition broken up. 
Nothing came of it in Indiana more than a temporary wave 
of indignation.^' At a public meeting in Vincennes Janu- 
ary 4, 1808, a resolution was adopted declaring Indiana had 
no sympathy with Burr. Floyd was indicted for treason, 
and upon conviction, sentenced to three hours' imprison- 
ment at Jeffersonville. 18 

§ 33 Development of the Territory 

Captain Thomas Hutchins of the English army, who 
was on the Wabash during the English occupation, 1764 to 
1778, said there were about sixty families at Vincennes. 
These were farmers and traders. He estimated the value of 
their fur trade at $25,000 annually. Corn, wheat, tobacco, 
and many kinds of fruits were common. Ouiatanon was a 
small post on the west side of the Wabash and contained a 
dozen families. The fur trade there totaled $40,000 an- 

1" Tradition has it th;it many of P.un-'s soldiers settled in various 
parts of Indiana, hiding, as they believed, from the government, which 
songht all of them as traitors. See Coel^rnm. A Pioneer Histonj of In- 
diana. 471, 477; John C. Lazenby in Indiana Mai/azine of Histonj, X, 
259. 

^8 American State Papers, Miscellaneous, I, 524; William H. Safford. 
The Biennerhassett Papers. 



INDIANA TERRITORY 179 

nuaily, he estimated. Capt. George Croghan, as mentioned 
above, estimated the population of Vincennes at ninety fam- 
ilies, and that of Ouiatanon at fourteen families. He was 
there in 1765. 

When Gen. Josiah Harmar visited Vincennes in 1788 he 
estimated the number of houses at near 400. Many of these 
were mere hovels built of poles or bark. The number of 
people he placed at about 900 French and 400 Americans. 
Their ancient prosperity was gone. The coming of the 
Americans had ruined their trade. Many of the inhabitants 
had to be supported at public expense during the winters. 

The census of 1800 showed Vincennes to have a popula- 
tion of 714, the neighborhood 819, or a total of 1,533 for the 
settlement. By this time quite a settlement had sprung up 
on Clark's Grant. The census of 1800 showed a population 
there of 919. The total population of Indiana Territory, 
5,641, was about evenly divided between what is now Indiana 
and Illinois. When Indiana and Illinois were separated, 
1809, the population was estimated at 28,000, of whom 
11,000 were west of the Wabash and 17,000 east of it. In 
the election for delegate to Congress, May 22, 1809, after 
the separation, Jonathan Jennings received 428 votes, 
Thomas Randolph 402, and John Johnson 81, making a total 
vote in the territory of 911. 

The census of 1810 gave the territory a population of 
24,520. In an industrial way this census showed a begin- 
ning. One cotton mill, making $150 worth of cloth, had 
been erected. There were 1,380 spinning wheels; 1,256 
looms ; one nail machine, making 20,000 pounds of nails, 
worth $4,000; IS tanneries, making $93,000 worth of 
leather; 28 distilleries, turning out annually 35,950 gallons 
of whiskey, worth $16,230 ; 3 powder mills, making 3,600 
pounds of powder, worth $1,800; one wheat mill, 32 grist 
mills, and three horse mills, grinding 40,900 bushels of 
wheat; 14 saw-mills, cutting 390,000 feet of lumber, worth 
$3,900, and 50,000 pounds of maple sugar being made, 
worth $5,000. 

Besides this there was made in the homes 54,977 yards 
of cotton cloth, 92,740 yards of flaxen goods, 61,503 yards 



180 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

of mixed, and 19,378 yards of woolen goods — a total product 
valued at $159,052. 

Commerce was lively in the new settlements. The road 
from New Albany to Vincennes was thronged with settlers. 
A memorial was presented to Congress asking the United 
States to construct a post road from Dayton, Ohio, by way 
of the Falls to Vincennes. The purpose was to extend it 
onward to St. Louis. It would thus connect the capitals of 
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois and furnish immigrants a way 
into the Missouri country. This was a forerunner of the 
National Road. A company was organized to build a canal 
around the Falls of the Ohio. In 1805 it petitioned Congress 
for a land grant of 25,000 acres. The Indian war stopped 
all this activity. 

In 1803 Indiana had 1,710 men enrolled in the militia, in 
1806 there were 1,846, in 1811 there were 4,160, in 1814 
there were 5,010. During most of this period there were two 
companies of United States regulars in the state, one at 
Fort Knox near Vincennes, the other at Fort Wayne. 

Hundreds of boats loaded with immigrants floated down 
the Ohio every year. Most of these stopped in Ohio and 
Kentucky, but a fair proportion made their way to In- 
diana.i^ 

19 See the Uniled >^latcs Cciikus Rciiort, 1810. for this dat.i. 



CHAPTER VIII 
indiana and the war of 1812 

§ 34 After the Treaty of Greenville 

The Indians who gathered with General Wayne at 
Greenville were a thoroughly beaten, humiliated band, de- 
feated in the field by their enemies, the Americans, and de- 
ceived by their supposed friends, the English. The genera- 
tion of Little Turtle had had enough of war, and were 
ready to bury the hatchet for good. For fifteen years 
thereafter they lived quietly in their rude homes, at peace 
among themselves and with the white man. By 1811 a 
generation had grown up that had forgotten the miseries 
of the long war and that knew only of the steady encroach- 
ments of the whites. 

The chief causes of the growing dissatisfaction of the 
Indians were the steady progress of white settlements into 
their hunting grounds, the enormous amount of whiskey 
furnished them at high prices — Harrison estimated that 
6,000 gallons were distributed annually to the 600 warriors 
on the Wabash — and the continual meddling of the Eng- 
lish. The fur trade was almost ruined by Napoleon's Con- 
tinental Policy. All these factors combining, kept the In- 
dians irritable, while the English emissaries fanned the 
growing anger until it burst into blaze. ^ 

In this crisis of Indian affairs the power of the peace- 
ful Little Turtle gradually declined. His place of influ- 
ence was taken by the war chief, Tecumseh. Tecumseh 

1 In the. Amerivan l^tate Papers. V, TOO. 801-804; III, 453, 462; II, 
402. fire printed, enousrb letters to show the sinister influence of the 
English ; see also Dawson's Life of Harrison; Drake's Life of Tecumseh; 
.T.-imes Hall, Sketches of liixtory. Life and Manners in the V,'e.^t. II. 
ch. ix. 

(13) 



182 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

had taken an honorable part in the war against Wayne. 
He was known among the tribes as a fearless, upright, 
generous man, an opposer of the white man, especially of 
the white man's vices. It was his ambition to unite all 
the northwestern tribes into a grand confederacy, and drive 
the settlers across the Ohio river. It was the same fatal 
ambition which had misled Philip, and Pontiac, and later 
was to mislead Black Hawk. 

Tecumseh and his brother, the Prophet, were born on 
Mad river, near Springfield, Ohio. Their mother was a 
Creek, their father a Shawnee, perhaps a war chief. Te- 
cumseh had long been a war chief; he learned from Little 
Turtle the patience, the cunning, and the strategy neces- 
sary to win in the game of war. The Prophet is said to 
have been a drunkard in his early life; but l^er he quit 
drinking whiskey and became a prophet, a spiritual leader 
of the tribesmen. He preached against drunkenness, 
witches, and the civilization borrowed from the white man. 
Both pleaded with their people to return to the customs 
of their ancestors, and renounce the vices of civilization. 

The Shawnees had some years before migrated west- 
ward from their home in Ohio and, mingling with the Dela- 
wares, had settled on the headwaters of White river where 
Anderson now stands. From there the fame of the Prophet 
spread over the entire northwest. Hundreds of Indians 
left their homes on the Great Lakes and came on pilgrim- 
ages to see this saviour of the people, this oracle. His 
visions and his sermons held the redmen spellbound, and, 
in form and substance his teachings compare favorably 
with those of other men who have won large portions of 
mankind for their followers. Even President Jefferson 
was interested in the teachings of the Prophet. 

Tecumseh took full advantage of the popularity of his 
brother. He talked with the visiting tribesmen, v/inning 
many of their chiefs to his own views. He taught that the 
Indians all belonged to one family, and should have one 
common government. Especially did he insist on their 
common ownership of the land, the common hunting 
grounds. No tribe, nor men, he persuaded his followers, 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 183 

had a legal right to sell an acre of their hunting ground 
to the white men. It had been left to them by their an- 
cestors as a common inheritance. The chiefs had no right 
to barter it away for a pewter ringlet or a keg of liquor. 
September 30, 1809, the chiefs concluded a treaty with 
Harrison at Fort Wajme, by which they deeded 3,000,000 
acres of land, a tract almost seventy miles square, for the 
petty trifle of $10,000 — one-third of a cent per acre. The 
Shawnees and the Wyandots, both refugee tribes, having 
no claims to the ceded lands, joined in a bitter protest, 
threatening to kill the chiefs who signed the treaty, and to 
murder the first white men who came on the purchased 
land. 

Meanwhile the Prophet, or as he was sometimes called, 
the Oracle, was carrying things with a high hand at his 
village of Andersontown. Some of the leading men of the 
tribe, including the old chief, were put to death for witch- 
craft. 

Fearing an outbreak if this Indian Mecca was not de- 
stroyed. Governor Harrison notified the Shawnees to stop 
the agitation. He denounced the Prophet as a fool, as an 
agent working for the British at Maiden, and demanded 
that the northern Indians be sent back to their homes. 

The Shawnees followed the advice of the governor and 
drove out the Prophet and his followers. The latter went 
west and settled on the Wabash near the mouth of the 
Tippecanoe. The governor's letter had shown Tecumseh 
that his own hold on the Indians was not yet very firm. 
He, accordingly, became more cautious, but continued his 
work of organization by visiting the different tribes, and 
cementing his alliances as best he could. The Prophet, on 
the contrary, continued his work more boldly than before 
in the new village. In August, 1808, he visited Harrison 
at Vincennes, and succeeded in smoothing over all their 
difficulties, the two parting with friendly assurances. 

The village on the Wabash, then known as the Prophets- 
town, soon became a worse nuisance than Andersontown 
had been. The connection with the British became more 
apparent and was finally acknowledged by the Prophet on 



184 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

one of his visits to Vincennes. It was while these negotia- 
tions were going on that the land cession at Fort Wayne 
was completed, September 30, 1809. This cession amount- 
ed to a declaration of war betv/een Tecumseh and Harrison. 

The warlike Wyandots were backing the Shawnee chiefs 
in the contest. Unmistakable signs of war appeared on 
the Upper Wabash. Messenger after messenger, Joseph 
Barron, Michael Brouillette, Touissant Dubois, Francis 
Vigo, Pierre La Plante, John Connor, William Prince, was 
dispatched to the tribes. All reported the same restless- 
ness and signs of war among the redmen. Warriors were 
breaking away from their chiefs, leaving their tribes, and 
joining Tecumseh and the Prophet. - 

During the summer of 1810, Governor Harrison deter- 
mined to summon Tecumseh to Vincennes for a conference. 
Joseph Barron was sent with an invitation to the Shaw- 
nee brothers to visit Vincennes and lay their grievances 
before the governor. The Prophet received the messenger 
coldly, denounced him in council as a traitor and a spy. 
Tecumseh, more politic than his brother, rescued Barron 
from his dangerous position and, after listening respect- 
fully to his message, promised to come to Vincennes im- 
mediately. 

The villagers of Vincennes were surprised August 12, 
1810, by the appearance among them of Tecumseh with 
400 armed warriors. The Indians showed no signs of hos- 
tility as they went quietly into camp in the grove at the 
north end of the village, near the Harrison home. The 
people who had flocked to the governor's home to hear the 
eloquent Indian orator, were in a panic until the dignified 
conduct of Tecumseh assured them of safety. Tecumseh 
refused to come into the house to hold council, and the 
meeting was therefore held under the trees in front of the 
governor's mansion. 

In fearless, straightforward language Tecumseh set 
forth his plan of an Indian confederacy, his belief in the 

2 lu addition to references cited above see Jacob Piatt Dunn, True 
Indian Stories; James R. Albacb, Wcntern Annals; Charles E. Slocum, 
The Ohio Country. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 185 

common ownership of the hunting grounds, and his de- 
termination to kill all the chiefs who had signed the late 
treaty at Fort Wayne. There could be no peace between 
the Indians and the whites, he declared, until the land was 
ceded back. When he had finished his speech he sat down 
on the ground, declining a seat beside the governor. 

Governor Harrison, in his turn, pointed out to the In- 
dian that if it had been the intention of the Great Spirit 
that the Indians should form one nation he would have 
given them one language instead of a score. He told Te- 
cumseh that the Shawnees had no claims whatever on the 
ceded lands, and that they were interesting themselves 
where they had no business. The lands had been purchased 
from the Miamis, who owned it. The chief's eyes gleamed 
with anger as he denied these statements, and charged the 
governor and the President of the United States with sharp 
practice toward the ignorant tribesmen. The interpreter, 
Barron, thinking, perhaps mistakenly, that one of the 
chief's gestures was a signal to his Indian companions to 
do violence, gave the alarm. Only the calmness of the 
leaders prevented bloodshed. The council was broken up 
and the Indians withdrew to their camp. 

Next day Tecumseh assured the governor that no vio- 
lence had been intended by the Indians. The council was 
renev/ed, but no progress was made in the settlement of 
the trouble. Tecumseh and the other chiefs present stated 
their determination to go on in the course they had planned. 
Harrison informed them that their demands for the re- 
turn of the land could not be considered. 

Both parties retired from the council to prepare for 
war. The governor called on the United States for troops 
and instructions. Regulars from the forts on the Ohio 
were sent to Vincennes, and the militia were prepared for 
a campaign. The Indians began to visit Canada to secure 
arms. Small companies harassed the frontier, stealing 
horses and destroying property. These raids brought a 
threat from the governor, June 24, 1811, that unless they 
were promptly stopped he would attack the Indian towns. 

One month later, July 27, Tecumseh with 300 men sud- 



186 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

denly appeared again at Vincennes, when he again asserted 
his friendly intentions. The governor, thinking it the plan 
of Tecumseh to overawe him, paraded 750 militia. After 
this conference in which he once more demanded the re- 
turn of the lands, Tecumseh sent his warriors home, and, 
with twenty companions, set out down the Wabash on a 
long mission to the southern Indians, not to return to Indi- 
ana till war had been begun and his league broken.^ 

§ 35 Tippecanoe 

Governor Harrison received orders from the Presi- 
dent, early in 1811, to break up the rendezvous of the In- 
dians on the Wabash, if he deemed it best. Col. John P. 
Boyd^ was ordered to transfer the Fourth Regiment of 
United States troops from Pittsburg to Louisville and re- 
port to Harrison for orders. The governor issued a proc- 
lamation calling for volunteers. Among the latter were 
many famous Indian fighters from Kentucky — Gen. Samuel 
Wells, Col. Abraham Owens, Joseph H. Daviess, Col. Fred- 
erick Geiger, Capt. Peter Funk, and Maj. George Croghan. 
Captain Funk brought a company of cavalry from Louis- 
ville. 

Governor Harrison gathered up a small army of less 
than 1,000 men at Vincennes, with whom he intended to. 
establish a post higher up on the Wabash. Leaving Fort 
Knox September 26, he reached the highlands at Terre 
Haute October 3. Here he began the construction of a 
small fort with blockhouses at three of its angles. The 
fort was completed by October 28, and properly dedicated 
by the eloquent Kentucky lawj'er, Jo. Daviess, who named 
it Fort Harrison. This fort, which covered about an acre 
of ground, stood on a bluff two miles up the river from 

3 Albach. Annals of the West, 819, seq; American State Papers, In- 
dian Affairs, I, 760. et passim; Rufus P>lancliard, The Discovery and 
Conquest of the Northwest, 242 ; J. B. Finley, Life Among the Indians, 
188; Dawsou. Life of Harrison; Executive Jotirnul of Indiana Terri- 
tory, in Puhlications of Indiana Historical Society, II. 

4 Percy Cross, Guerrilla Leaders of the World, has a biography of 
Col. Boyd. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 187 

the old Wea village, and thirty or forty feet above the 
water's edge. 

Here signs of Indian hostility appeared ; a sentinel was 
shot, the frightened Delawares and Miamis came to assure 
Harrison of their own friendship, and to report the war- 
like preparations of the Prophet. A deputation of friendly 
Indians was sent with a letter to the Prophet, but no one 
ever returned. Col. James Miller, the hero later at Lundy's 
Lane, was left in charge of the fort. 

The main army left Fort Harrison October 29, and di- 
rected its march toward the Prophetstown. It consisted 
of 910 men, 250 of whom were regulars under Boyd, sixty 
volunteers from Kentucky, and 600 Indiana militia. The 
mounted men, dragoons and riflemen, numbering 270, were 
under command of Wells and Daviess. In order to take 
advantage of the more open country on the western bank, 
the army crossed to the west side of the Wabash near the 
present town of Montezuma. • The deep gorge of Pine 
creek was approached with care for here Clark had found 
the Indians in 1780, as had Hamtramck in 1790. No In- 
dians were seen, however, and the army marched on un- 
molested till it came within six miles of the Prophetstown. 
Indians then began to hover on the flanks of the army, so 
that the commander deemed it necessary to march in line 
of battle with front, flanks, and rear protected by scouts. 
The interpreters tried in vain to engage the Indians in con- 
versation. Dubois undertook to carry a message to the 
town but the threatening attitude of the savages drove him 
back. The army was within a mile of the town, march- 
ing directly upon it, when the Indians came out and begged 
for a conference. After friendly greetings were inter- 
changed, Harrison assured them of his readiness to go into 
council, if a suitable place for a camp could be found. A 
high point of ground on the banks of Burnett creek, one 
mile northwest of the Indian village, was pointed out. 
There, after exchanging promises with the chiefs that no 
fighting should be engaged in till the morrow, Harrison led 
his army into camp. The site selected was an admirable 

5 J. Wesley Whicker, in the Attica Ledger-Press, August 14. 1914. 



188 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

place for a permanent camp, but not easily guarded against 
an Indian surprise. Low ground, covered with tall grass, 
willows, and vines, surrounded it. It was, doubtless, the 
best camp site in the whole neighborhood. Harrison was 
not put off his guard by the promises of the Indians. He 
disposed his little army in a hollow square, conforming his 
lines to the sides of the highland, with pickets far out in all 
directions. All necessary orders were given in anticipa- 
tion of a night attack. The men took their positions in 
line and slept on their arms. The night was dark, and a 
drizzly rain fell at intervals. 

Ail was different in the camp of the red men. Women 
and children made hasty preparation to flee for their lives 
if the Indian attack should fail. Tradition has it that the 
Prophet called his warriors to council, brought out the 
Magic Bowl, the Medean Fire, and the String of Sacred 
Beans. The touch of these talismans, he said, made the 
warrior invulnerable. After a trance and a vision, he told 
them the time for the destruction of the white men had 
come; the Great Spirit was ready to lead them; and he 
would protect the warrior from the bullet of the paleface. 
The war-song and the dance followed, till, in a fit of frenzy, 
the warriors seized their weapons and rushed out, a lead- 
erless mob, to attack the Americans. 

The American soldiers lay quietly on their guns, few 
of the militia slept, till about four o'clock in the morning 
when the sharp crack of a sentry's rifle awoke them. The 
plan of the Indians had been to creep on the sentinels, 
tomahawk them, and then rush from all sides on the camp. 
It was Harrison's habit, when in the Indian country, to 
call his troops to arms about four o'clock, and keep them 
in line till broad day-light. On the morning of November 
7, he was just pulling on his boots, preparatory to having 
the army roused, when the attack was made. The Indian 
army, perhaps 700 strong, rose from the grass and with a 
yell rushed on the camp. Many of them broke through the 
confused lines only to be killed instantly by the roused sol- 
diers. Most of the white men received the attack in line, 
but a few were not awakened in time. The campfires were 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 189 

put out and the two armies engaged in a deadly struggle, 
hand-to-hand in places, in places separated by ten or twenty 
yards. The general mounted a horse and rode to the spot 
where the attack was hottest, ordered the reserves to the 
points hardest pressed, and watched over the battle as best 
he could. The lines were maintained until daylight showed 
where the Indians were. Then attacking parties were 
formed and a few well directed charges drove the Indians 
away. Their attack had failed ; partly for want of a leader, 
for had a man like Little Turtle commanded the Indians 
it would have gone hard with the white men; partly on 
account of the skill of General Harrison and the remark- 
able behaviour of his men, many of whom had never been 
under fire before. 

The victory had been won at heavy cost ; Colonel Owens 
was shot as he rode with the commander toward the point 
of the first attack; Captain Spencer, his first and second 
lieutenants, and Captain Warrick, all fell in this first on- 
slaught; Jo. Daviess was killed in an attempt to raise the 
Indians by a cavalry charge; Capt. W. C. Baen, Lieut. 
Richard McMahan, Thomas Berry, Thomas Randolph, and 
Col. Isaac White also fell. Thirty-seven men lay dead on 
the field, and twenty-five more died from their wounds 
within a short time. One hundred and twenty-six were 
wounded, including Colonels Bartholomew and Decker, and 
Lieutenants Peters and Gooding. The numbers of the In- 
dians engaged v/ere never learned. Thirty-eight dead war- 
riors were left on the field. 

The next day after the battle Harrison gathered up his 
battered army, and, after destroying the Prophetstown 
with all its supplies, made his way slowly back to Vin- 
cennes, reaching Fort Knox November 18.'^- 

f* Harrison's official report is iciven in full in Ai)i('i-ican State Papo's, 
Indian Affairs, I. TTti : Alb.ich. Annals- of the West, 835; Niles Register, 
I, 238; Capt. Alfred Pirtle. The Battle of Tippeeanoe, Filson Glut) ]'uh- 
licutions, 'So. 15; Indiana Magazine of Historn, II. contains the .iouruals 
of John Tipton and Isaac Xaylor, both present at the battle. 



190 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

§ 36 Indian War on the Frontier 

The defeat of the Prophet broke up his town at the 
mouth of the Tippecanoe. Leaving the Wabash tribes, 
among whom he was thoroughly discredited, he started on 
a long tour among the Pottawattomies, Kickapoos, and 
Winnebagoes. As a result of his work, bands of these In- 
dians appeared on the remote frontiers. Murders were 
committed at Chicago, and along the west side of the Wa- 
bash. Nearly all the advanced settlements were abandoned, 
the settlers falling back on the more populous communities. 
Governor Harrison gave orders, April 16, 1812, to the mi- 
litia to hold themselves in readiness for immediate action. 

Little Turtle, the aged chief of the Miamis, sent word 
from his home near Fort Wayne that the Miamis still stood 
by their treaty vow of friendship, though English agents 
were among them urging them on to war. The Delawares 
likewise renewed their pledge of friendship. 

B. F. Stickney, the Indian agent at Fort Wayne, re- 
ported that a grand council of all the tribes met on the 
Mississinewa May 21, 1812, Twelve tribes were repre- 
sented. The council lasted two days. English agents again 
urged the tribes to united war, but all the Indian speakers 
expressed opposition to a renewal of the struggle. These 
agents urged the Indians to visit Maiden, where they would 
be presented with arms and ammunition. Stickney wrote 
that bands of Indians were passing Fort Wayne every day 
on the way to or from Maiden. The Pottawattomie chief, 
Marpack, collected an army of hostile savages in the forest 
south of Detroit. This army seems to have been provi- 
sioned and armed by the English at Maiden. 

Meanwhile the frontier of Indiana was put in a state 
of defense. A row of blockhouses, or forts as they were 
called by the settlers, was constructed from Vincennes to 
Greenville. From May to August, always a time of great 
scarcity among the Indians, little damage was done on the 
border, but all were fearful of outbreaks as soon as the 
roasting-ear season opened. 

In the meantime war was declared with England and 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 191 

Gen. William Hull, governor of Michigan, was sent to De- 
troit with a United States army. 

The first blow of the Indian war was destined to fall 
on Fort Dearborn, where Chicago is now. On August 7, 
1812, Capt. Nathan Heaid received orders from General 
Hull to evacuate the fort and join the general at Detroit. 
Winnamac, a friendly Pottawattomie chief, the bearer of 
the dispatch, advised Captain Heald not to leave the fort. 
The Indians, as Winnamac well knew, were on the war- 
path. Captain Heald, in defiance of the advice of every- 
body, distributed his goods to the Indians, destroyed his 
ammunition and guns, dismantled the fort, and set out on 
the march to Fort Wayne. Captain Wells with a relief 
party of friendly Miamis came just in time to join in the 
retreat. 

As all but the rash commander expected, the little gar- 
rison, and women and children accompanying it, were at- 
tacked as soon as they were well out of the fort. Fifty- 
two men, women, and children were killed and twenty-eight 
captured." Captain Heald showed in this affair about the 
same judgment and ability as his superior, General Hull, 
did in the surrender of Detroit the next day. These two 
disasters left Indiana exposed to the full brunt of the In- 
dian attack. The storm broke along the whole frontier in 
early September.*^ 

The massacre of the garrison at Fort Dearborn was 
the signal for a general uprising among the northwestern 
Indians. Only a few Miamis and Delawares, under the 
influence of Little Turtle, remained friendly to the whites. 
Blackbird, who had led in the massacre at Fort Dearborn, 
pushed on rapidly toward Fort Wayne with his Indian 
army. The fall of Macinac, Fort Dearborn, and Detroit 
destroyed all American authority. Tecumseh hurried from 
tribe to tribe urging union in action. All were to join in 
one grand attack to sweep the invaders across the Ohio. 

7 Milo Qunife. Chicago (tnd Ihc Old NorihivvKt, index: m ni.niuscript 
letter by W. J. Jordan, an officer under Heald, throws light on the 
massacre. 

8 Historical Register, II, ch. I, No. 15. 



192 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The British general, Henry Procter, assisted Tecumseh 
in planning the attack. September 1 was the time set when 
the attack should be delivered at Forts Wayne and Harri- 
son. Major Muir with a small force of British regulars 
was to march up the Maumee and assist at the capture of 
Fort Wayne. 

The garrison at the latter fort numbered about seventy, 
under the command of Capt. James Rhea. The fort also 
contained four small cannon. As early as August 28, par- 
ties of savages were seen loafing around in the neighbor- 
hood. Their purpose no doubt was to take advantage of 
any opportunity that might be offered to kill any soldiers 
that might stray too far from the fortifications. The 
Miamis in the neighborhood still professed friendship and 
tried several times to gain admission to the fort. 

All tricks having failed, the Indians opened fire on the 
sentinels of Fort Wayne on the night of September 5. An 
ambush cleverly planned on the morning of September 6 
resulted in the death of two soldiers of the garrison. That 
night a direct assault was made on the fort in which, al- 
though about 600 strong, the red men were beaten back 
from the palisades without loss or damage to the garrison. 
The next scheme was to frighten the garrison by means of 
a Quaker battery which they constructed and placed in po- 
sition during the night. An Indian flag the next morning 
announced to the amused garrison that the British had sent 
a battery, and unless the fort was surrendered immediately 
it would be battered down and the garrison put to the tor- 
ture. There was perfect quiet then for three days, at the 
end of which time the Indians again resumed firing, which 
they continued briskly for twelve hours. On the follow- 
ing day the soldiers were startled by a frightful war-whoop 
resounding from all parts of the surrounding forest. An- 
other desperate but fruitless assault followed. 

General Harrison, who was stationed over at Piqua, 
Ohio, with an army, had sent Maj. William Oliver to notify 
the garrison that he was on his way with relief. Oliver 
reached the fort after some remarkable feats of daring, 
and it was the news he brought that nerved the little gai ri- 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 193 

son through the seven days' battle. At the approach of 
the reinforcements, September 12, the Indians retired.-* 

For the purposes of terrorizing the border and pre- 
venting any aid being sent to Fort Wayne or Fort Harri- 
son, a band of warriors penetrated the forests to the Pigeon 
Roost Settlement in the northern part of what is now Scott 
county September 3. Two men hunting on the outskirts 
of the little community were murdered. The Indians then 
fell on the unprotected settlement and killed, within one 
hour, another man, five women, and sixteen children. The 
murders were accompanied with all the cruelty of which 
the Indians were capable. William Collings, a man past 
60 years of age, defended his house successfully against 
the cowardly wretches. 

The Clark county militia were immediately called out 
and proceeded to the Pigeon Roost Settlement. Next day 
two companies of militia followed the trail of the Indians 
till dark, but gave it up. The Indians, numbering not more 
than a dozen, were thus allowed to escape without punish- 
ment.^" 

At almost the same hour when Payne and Coffman, the 
hunters, were killed at the Pigeon Roost, two workmen 
were killed near Fort Harrison. The next day a party of 
Indians, chiefs from the Winnebago, Kickapoo, Pottawat- 
tomie, and Shawnee tribes, came to the fort and asked the 
commander, Capt. Zachary Taylor, for a conference the 
next day. They were from the Prophetstown, and Taylor 
suspected at once that they were on the warpath. 

The next Captain Taylor heard of them was when he 
was awakened at eleven o'clock that night by the report of 
a sentinel's rifle. The captain rushed out of his quarters 
to find that the Indians had fired the blockhouse at the lower 

" Blaucliiird, Discorcnj and Conquest of the 'Sorthicest, 289; Benson 
J. Lossiug. Pietorial Field Book of War of 1812, 315; Historieal Regis- 
ter, II. ch. 3, No. 2; Wallace A. Bryce. History of Fort Wayne; Mann 
Butler. History of Kentucliy. 

10 Charles Martindale, Publications of Indiana Historical Society, II; 
Dillon, History of Indiana. 492; Good accounts are in Western Sun, Sep- 
tember 26 and October 6. 1812. Lossing. Field Book of War of 1812, 
314; John Ketcham. Reminiscenses ; John C. Lazeuby, in Indiana Maga- 
zine of History, X. 263. 



194 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

corner of the fort. Of the fifty men in the garrison over 
half, including Captain Taylor himself, were on the sick 
list. By the time Taylor had paraded his troops the block- 
house, where all the supplies except the powder were kept, 
was burning rapidly, and the Indians were pressing the at- 
tack. The prospect looked gloomy. Some of the soldiers 
who responded were too weak to stand up. Two of the 
ablest jumped over the palisade and attempted to escape. 
Nothing saved the fort from destruction but the spirit of 
the captain. The blockhouse burned, but the barracks were 
saved by heroic efforts. The gap in the wall was only 
twenty feet and no Indian dared enter it. The troops were 
properly placed, order was restored, men repaired the fort 
where the fire had damaged it, and by daylight the Indians 
were repulsed. 

The Indians merely drew back to the cover of the woods. 
It was necessary to get word to Vincennes. At length after 
several failures a messenger, on a dark night, succeeded in 
passing the Indian lines and reaching Vincennes. Col. Wil- 
liam Russell, who was collecting an army to make an attack 
on the upper Wabash towns, pushed on up the valley after 
receiving Taylor's letter, and soon relieved the fort. Cap- 
tain Taylor had lost six men, three killed and three wound- 
ed. Of the two cowards who attempted to run away, one 
ran directly into the hands of the Indians, by whom he was 
killed; the other was driven back to the walls of the fort 
by the Indians, and sneaked inside after they were re- 
pulsed.^i 

General Harrison reached Fort Wayne September 12, 
1812, with over 2,000 men. Disappointed in not meeting 
the Indians in battle, he determined to punish the tribes- 
men at once. After resting his men a few days he divided 
them into several battalions. One of these, under Colonel 
Simrall, was sent to destroy the town of Little Turtle on 
Eel river. Col. Samuel Wells led another division against 
the town of Chief Five Medals of the Pottawattomies on 

^^ Niles' Register, III, 90; this gives Taylor's official report. Loss- 
ing. Field Book of War of 1812, 317 ; Historical Register, II, ch. 3^ 
No. S. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 195 

the Elkhart. Colonel Payne led still another division down to 
the forks of the Wabash to destroy the Miami towns in 
that neighborhood. All these towns were deserted by the 
Indians. 

Years of peace had taught the Indians many of the 
simpler arts of civilization. Large fields of growing corn 
surrounded the villages. Log huts had largely taken the 
places of the earlier wigwams. Everything nevertheless 
was included in the vengeance of the invaders except the 
house of Little Turtle, built for him by the government 
at his village on Eel river. That aged chief had passed 
away July 21, 1812, and had been buried with military 
honors by the garrison at Fort Wayne. A worse blow than 
the destruction of their towns could not have been inflicted 
on the savages. During the approaching winter there was 
nothing for them to do but go to Maiden and beg from the 
British. 

Harrison left his army under command of Gen. James 
Winchester while he hastened over to Piqua to organize 
forces for the recovery of Detroit. Winchester soon moved 
down the Maumee and the scene of war drifted over into 
Ohio.i^ 

The urgent message of Captain Taylor, as noted above, 
brought Col. William Russell posthaste from Vincennes 
v/ith 1,200 men. Russell reached Fort Harrison with his 
army September 16, without having seen the enemy, but 
his provision train, together with an escort of eleven men, 
fell into the hands of the savages. A regiment of Ken- 
tucky volunteers under Colonel Wilcox remained at Fort 
Harrison. Russell with the remainder hastened back to 
Vincennes, as he had been on his way to join Governor 
Ninian Edwards of Illinois in an attack on the Kickapoo 
Indians on Peoria Lake. 

Meanwhile Kentucky volunteers kept arriving at Vin- 
cennes and joining Gen. Samuel Hopkins until that com- 
mander found himself in charge of a well-equipped army 
of 4,000 men, 2,000 of whom were expert riflemen well 
mounted. On October 10, he left Vincennes with the 

'^'■^ Historical Register, II, ch. 3. No. 11. 



196 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

mounted riflemen on an expedition against the Illinois 
tribes on the Illinois river. In four days he reached Fort 
Harrison, crossed the Wabash, and camped on the edge of 
the great prairie. On October 20, after meeting a prairie 
fire which did no damage, the army refused to march 
further. The general called for 500 volunteers to go on 
with him, but no one responded. The infamous rabble then 
came back to Vincennes and was dismissed from the service. 

As mentioned above. Colonel Russell was to join the 
governor of Illinois and cooperate with Hopkins in an at- 
tack. Russell with two companies of United States regu- 
lars left Vincennes October 11, 1812, and, joining Gov- 
ernor Edwards, fell on the principal Kickapoo town at 
the head of Peoria Lake, inflicting a severe defeat on the 
Indians. More than a score of warriors were killed. 

After returning to Vincennes and dismissing his muti- 
nous troops. General Hopkins organized an expedition of 
1,200 infantry, with which he set out up the Wabash for 
the purpose of destroying the Prophetstown. His three 
regiments were commanded by Colonels Barbour, Miller, 
and Wilcox, while Captain Taylor led the regulars. On 
November 11 he left Fort Harrison by the road Governor 
Harrison had made the previous year. The expedition con- 
tinued up the east side of the Wabash and reached the 
Prophetstown November 19. Butler was sent from there 
with 300 men to destroy a Winnebago town near the mouth 
of Wildcat creek. The Prophetstown and a large Kickapoo 
village of 160 huts, a short distance down the river, to- 
gether with a large amount of provisions stored in the 
three towns, were destroyed. 

No Indians were met until two days later when a small 
force of soldiers were attacked and one man killed. On 
the next morning a party of sixty horsemen were ambushed 
on Wild Cat creek and eighteen killed. The Indian camp 
was broken up, but, the weather suddenly turning bitter 
cold, the army returned hastily to Vincennes.^^^ 

Driven from their home towns, the Miamis, now nearly 
all in the service of the British, had gathered in the Mis- 

1?' Hopkins" Reitorts are given in VvVr.s-' Rr(/istcr. III. 171. 100 and "Jol. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 197 

sissinewa towns. There they had been joined by the Dela- 
wares and the Munsees from White river. They were in 
threatening distance of the settlements both in Indiana and 
Ohio. For this reason General Harrison, then at Frank- 
linton, Ohio, decided to destroy them. A strong column 
was accordingly made up of Colonel Simrall's Kentucky 
dragoons, some United States dragoons under Maj. James 
V. Ball, a corps of United States regulars, and some Penn- 
sylvania riflemen. The force numbered about 600 men. 

On November 25, 1812, Col. John B. Campbell, who com- 
manded the expedition, left camp for the attack on the 
Mississinewa towns. His route led by Springfield, Xenia, 
Dayton, Eaton, and Greenville. At Dayton he was delayed 
till December 14, by the lack of horses. Winter had set in 
and the frozen ground was covered with a mantle of snow. 
By forced marches he covered the remaining eighty miles 
in three days. 

In the early morning light of December 17, the troops 
attacked an Indian town, killed eight warriors, took forty 
prisoners, and burned the town. Leaving the prisoners in 
charge of the infantry, the horsemen pushed on down the 
river and destroyed three villages, among them that of the 
Munsee chief. Silver Heels, with their winter stores, in- 
cluding quite a number of cattle and horses. That night 
they returned to the infantry and went into camp. This 
camp was on the north bank of the Mississinewa river, near 
the mouth of Metociniah creek, about a mile from the pres- 
ent village of Jalapa, in Grant county. The troops camped 
in the form of a square, the angles protected by light forti- 
fications. 

Here about five o'clock the next morning they were furi- 
ously attacked by a force of about 300 Indians who had 
crept up under cover of a rocky bluff on the north bank 
of the river. For over an hour a bloody battle raged at 
close quarters. The onslaught was desperate and it was 
met bravely. Captain Pierce, who commanded the guard, 
was tomahawked as he stubbornly contested the battle. 
With the coming of daylight the fire of the riflemen put 
the Indians to rout, but not until they had killed eight 

(14) 



198 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

and wounded forty-two white men. Fifteen Indians were 
found dead on the field. The expedition made its way 
slowly back to headquarters at Franklinton, and the fight- 
ing in Indiana was over for the year.'^ 

§ 37 Life on the Frontier 

Every possible precaution was taken by the territorial 
and national governments to protect the Indiana frontier 
during the year 1813. Three plans were adopted to insure 
the safety of the settlers. 

First — Enough blockhouses were constructed so that 
each farmer could leave his family in one. This necessi- 
tated one in every settlement. Within the present limits 
of Knox, Daviess, Martin, Orange, Jackson, Bartholomew, 
Jennings, Ripley, Franklin, Decatur, and Wayne counties 
most of these forts were located, although some were lo- 
cated farther from the border in Gibson, Pike, Clark, and 
Washington counties. 

Second — The militia were organized carefully and some 
of them kept on duty all the time. The reports show that 
Indiana had 4,160 men enrolled. Added to these were 
large numbers of Kentuckians who volunteered for duty 
in Indiana. While the militia were not under very strict 
discipline they did much hard service, usually furnishing 
their own arms and provisions. There were five or six 
regiments. Sixteen companies were called into active 
service. 

Third — The United States employed from one to five 
companies of rangers — militia sworn into United States 
service. At first a single company was organized to guard 
the country around Vincennes. On November 23, 1812, 
Jonathan Jennings, the Indiana delegate, offered a resolu- 
tion in Congress giving the President power to organize 
two more companies. Reports were coming in daily show- 
ing that raids were being committed by the Indians along 

i4Lossing, Field Book of the War of 1812. 347; Nlles' Register, III, 
30(): Sarah J. Line, in Indiana Mai/aziiir of Histori/, IX, 187; Camp- 
bell's Report to Harrison is in the State Papers, 152, and Historical 
Register, II, 40. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 199 

a border of 200 miles in Indiana. By act of February 25, 
1813, the President was given authority to raise ten addi- 
tional companies. Acting under this law, the President au- 
thorized Acting Governor Gibson to organize four new com- 
panies of rangers. Each company consisted of about 100 
men commanded by a captain. 

No attacks in force were made by the Indians in Indiana 
during the latter years of the war. During the early months 
of 1813 they kept the border in terror by a series of petty 
raids. Scouting parties penetrated deep into the settle- 
ments to steal and murder. A man was killed on the Wa- 
bash below the mouth of White river ; a week later two men 
were killed just below Vincennes on the Illinois side. Ten 
days later, March 13, two men were killed ten miles from 
Brookville in Franklin county. On the same day three men 
were killed in Wayne county. Five days later one man was 
killed and three wounded near Vallonia, in Bartholomew 
county. On March 28, a party of men in boats were at- 
tacked below Fort Harrison, two of whom were killed and 
six wounded. On April 16, two men were killed eight 
miles west of Vallonia. ^^ 

Such outrages as those just mentioned naturally called 
for vigorous effort on the part of the rangers. The In- 
dians found the swamps and dense forests of Driftwood a 
complete mask to their depredations. They would slip into 
a neighborhood, kill a farmer, preferably at daybreak when 
he came out to feed his stock, gather up the horses on the 
place, and disappear into the impenetrable thickets of Drift- 
wood before the rangers could get on the trail. 

At first the rangers tried to patrol the whole frontier, 
but this was soon found useless. Next, small companies 
were stationed at advantageous places with orders to pur- 
sue any savages that made their appearance. 

As stated above, a man was killed near Vallonia March 
18. Maj. John Tipton, the most skillful of the rangers, 

3 5 The best accounts of these outrages are given hi N lies' Register, 
and the Western Sun. These were contemporary papers; for other 
accounts see .Tohn Ketchani's Autohiography; writings of John Tipton ; 
letters printed in Cockruni's Pioneer History of Iiidiniia : and various 
county histories. 



200 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

with twenty-nine men took up the trail of the savages. 
Twenty-five miles up Driftwood he found them camped on 
an Island. Several of the Indians were killed, the rest 
escaping by swimming the river. On April 16, the same 
captain with thirty-one men took the trail of a band of 
Indians who had murdered two men west of Vallonia. 
Swimming five streams, wading for miles in swamps waist 
deep, in almost continuous rain, he followed them three 
days before he overtook them. He intended to surprise 
them in their camp that night, but following too closely, 
they came upon an Indian who had stopped to fix his pack. 
Warned by the shot, the Indian's companions abandoned 
their horses and fled, following the high hills bordering 
Salt creek toward the Delaware towns on White river. 

These and other evidences led the people to believe that 
the Delaware Indians on upper White river were doing the 
mischief on the border. For the purpose of destroying 
these towns Col. Joseph Bartholomew, commander-in-chief 
of the militia, mustered an expedition of 137 men at Val- 
lonia in June, 1813. There were three companies of 
rangers under Captains Williamson Dunn, James Bigger, 
and C. Peyton, John Tipton and David Owen acting as 
guides.^" 

They left Vallonia June 11, and in four days reached 
the Delaware towns 100 miles distant. The towns were 
already deserted and most of them burned. Twelve miles 
lower down, another town was found with a plentiful sup- 
ply of corn. A small party of Indians on their way to this 
town after corn was attacked and one of them killed. It 
was thought that the Indians were using these towns as a 
half-way place in their attacks on the settlements. Every- 
thing was destroyed and the expedition returned home, ar- 
riving June 21. 

With a view to further punishment of the Indians, Col. 
William Russell of the Seventh United States regulars, and 
commander of the department, gathered another force at 
Vallonia as soon as Bartholomew had returned, to strike 

If' The roster of these conipjinies is given in .John Ketcham's Auto- 
hio!n'(tph]i. 



INDIANA AND THE WAR OF 1812 201 

the towns on the lower Mississinewa. He left camp at 
Vallonia July 1, with 573 men and marched by way of the 
Delaware towns to the Mississinewa. He found these 
towns all deserted. It seems no Indians had been 
there since early spring. From there, Russell marched to 
the Eel River village, thence to Winnamac, Prophetstown, 
the Winnebago town on Wild Cat creek, and thence to Fort 
Harrison. Not an Indian was seen. Small parties left the 
main force at the Prophetstown and crossed over to the 
settlements on the Ohio river, but no trace of savages could 
be found. All the old Indian fighters of Indiana and Ken- 
tucky, among them Maj. Zachary Taylor, joined Russell 
in the invasion. It showed beyond a doubt that the Indian 
power in Indiana was broken. ^'^ 

Aftr the Indians had been defeated at Fort Wayne and 
Fort Harrison, especially after the bloody disaster on the 
Mississinewa, the discouraged warriors began to withdraw 
out of harm's way. The Miamis and Delawares, who had 
avowed friendship for the white people, moved over into 
Ohio under the immediate protection of the American 
army. The Shawnees, together with those Miamis who had 
joined them, under the Prophet returned to Detroit and 
placed themselves under the protection of the British. 

The British were forced to evacuate Detroit in Septem- 
ber, 1813. A few days later they were annihilated at the 
Battle of the Thames. Tecumseh was killed. There was 
no choice left for the Indians but to make the best possible 
terms of peace with their enemies, the Americans. Otta- 
was, Chippewas, Pottawattomies, Kickapoos, and Miamis 
came to Detroit and asked that the war cease. Their con- 
dition was pitiable. The women and children were naked 
and starving. They hardly dared go on hunting trips for 
fear of the American rangers, who took no prisoners. The 
haughty warriors, who a year before had met in high spir- 
it Dillon, History of Indiana, 520, seq. An Autobiography, by John 
Ketchaiu; gives an excellent picture of conditions nronnd Vallonia. 
The mustei" rolls of the ranker companies are given, those of James 
Bigger and Williamson Dunn entire. An excellent contemporary ac- 
count of the War of 1812 is a History of the Late War, by an American, 
Baltimore, 1816. 



202 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

its and plotted to drive the Americans across the Ohio, were 
now compelled to beg bread at the hands of their con- 
querors. 

An armistice was agreed to between Major General 
Harrison and the assembled tribes at Detroit October 14, 
1813. Over 3,000 Indians at Detroit and 1,500 at Fort 
Wayne had to be fed by the government during the follow- 
ing winter. The women and children were provided with 
clothing and shelter and the warrior^s with guns and ammu- 
nition that they might again engage in the chase. 

On July 8, 1814, General Harrison and Gen. Lewis Cass 
met the tribes at Greenville and explained to them the 
terms of a new treaty. This treaty, the Second Treaty of 
Greenville, did not materially change the relation between 
the whites and savages. 

The war was extremely disastrous to the red men.- It 
left them a hopeless, sullen, broken people. Had it not 
been for the interference of the English they could have 
been spared the humiliation. The English drew the storm 
down upon them and then gave them no aid. From the 
fall of Detroit to the defeat on the Thames the British 
troops did none of the fighting. The conduct of the Eng- 
lish was as cowardly as it was disastrous to the Indians. 
The latter had made considerable progress in civilized life 
before the war, but this was all destroyed. What was 
worse, the pioneers lost all respect for them, and began a 
systematic effort to drive them from the border. 



CHAPTER IX 
from territory to state 

§ 38 New Settlements 

The year 1800 found very few settlers in what is now 
Indiana. The Treaty of Greenville in 1795 had established 
the boundary line between the land of the United States and 
that set apart for the northwestern Indians and had given 
to the Indians all lands within the State except a small 
tract; six miles square where Fort Wayne now stands; a 
tract two miles square on the Wabash, where the portage 
path from Fort Wayne struck the river; a tract six miles 
square on the Wabash river at Ouiatanon; 149,000 acres 
at the Falls of the Ohio, known as Clark's Grant; the land 
around Vincennes, and a strip of land lying east of the line 
drawn from Fort Recovery down to the Ohio river oppo- 
site the mouth of the Kentucky. 

Almost all of the white inhabitants lived under the pro- 
tection of the stockade at the post of Vincennes. What 
farming there was, was done in the immediate neighbor- 
hood of that post. Few Americans had settled at Vin- 
cennes thus early. On the north side of the Ohio river, 
at the Falls, there were a few settlers on Clark's Grant. 
This tract, embracing 149,000 acres, had been conveyed 
by the General Assembly of Virginia in 1786 to General 
Clark and his soldiers as payment for their services in cap- 
turing Vincennes and Kaskaskia. 

The townsite of Clarksville had been laid out in 1783. 
Emigrants began to arrive soon afterwards. The village 
of Springville with its stockade, Fort Steuben, and its com- 
pany of soldiers, was most attractive to these new settlers. 
This village became the county seat of Clark county, and 
remained so until 1802, when Jeffersonville was founded 



204 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

and made the county seat. It is said that this latter city- 
was planned by Thomas Jefferson. Only alternate squares 
were to be used for building sites, the others being reserved 
as parks and city gardens. 

Among the distinguished citizens of this early settle- 
ment were the first governor, Jonathan Jennings, a New 
Jersey Presbyterian, Gen. John Carr of Pennsylvania, who 
served with distinction in the Battle of Tippecanoe and in 
the War of 1812, and Judge Charles Dewey of Massachu- 
setts, a leading lawyer and lawmaker in the early history 
of the State. 

Another settlement that dates back into the eighteenth 
century was in Dearborn county. This settlement was in 
and around where Aurora now stands, and the Morrisons, 
Cards, Gerald, Hardins, and Grays were among the early 
settlers. A mill was built here in 1800. The Baptist 
church was organized in 1807. Lawrenceburg, the county 
seat, was laid out in 1802 by Samuel Vance, James Hamil- 
ton, and Benjamin Chambers, all of whom had seen service 
in the Revolution. 

Switzerland county was also inhabited at this time, a 
settlement having been made in 1795 by Heathcote Pickett 
and family near Plum creek, about three miles above Vevay. 
This family was joined during the next two or three years 
by the Dickinson, Cotton, and Gullion families, who settled 
on the lowlands along the river. During the year 1796 
there came to this neighborhood John and James Dufour 
from Canton Vaud, Sv/itzerland. They were looking for a 
location for a colonization society, and made the selection 
of this land between Indian and Plum creeks, purchasing 
from Congress 2,560 acres. The company did not reach 
the new home until 1803. These Swiss reestablished their 
old Vevay of Switzerland in the new Vevay in Switzerland 
county, Indiana. 

All told, the settlers in the four counties did not exceed 
1,000 persons. Besides these there were numerous hunt- 
ers, trappers, and squatters along the western, southwest- 
em and southern borders. About these there is an end- 
less amount of tradition in the border counties, and many 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 205 

01 the traditions have been preserved in the county his- 
tories. 

It is impossible in discussing the early settlements of 
any of the western States to do more than indicate the main 
lines of immigration. The movement was like the skirmish 
line of a great army searching out every nook and corner 
of the new country. The pioneers advanced along all pos- 
sible lines of travel and located in the most unexpected 
places. Many of their actions are unexplainable to us after 
the lapse of a century. The prevalence of game and pure 
water was an attraction that led many of them. Others 
kept to the highland to avoid the fevers and the ague. Some 
sought the timber-land; others for exactly opposite rea- 
sons sought the prairies. No single explanation will fit 
many cases. 

It is impossible to get an adequate description of the 
migration. The progress, however, was not different from 
that of the settlement of the other early western States. 
An impartial history would compel us to tell the story of 
every individual settler, since there is little reason why one 
settler or one settlement was more significant than another. 
There was no waiting for Indians to become quiet, no wait- 
ing for roads to be built, no waiting until the government 
had built stockades, or sent troops to furnish adequate pro- 
tection. As game became scarce in the woods of Kentucky 
and Ohio, the hunters crossed into Indiana. When they 
found suitable locations, they became squatters. When the 
land ofiice opened in the neighborhood, they became settlers, 
and when a few more joined them, a government was or- 
ganized and they became citizens. Thus in 1800, Woolsey 
Pride settled at White Oak Springs, Pike county. The fol- 
lowing year he was joined by the Mileys, Conrads, Tislows, 
Smiths, and Alexanders. By 1811 a good sized community 
had been formed and a stockade fort was erected on the 
present site of Petersburg. 

As early as 1800, white men crossed over into Harrison 
county from Brandenburg for purposes of hunting and 
farming. In 1802 Squire Boone, brother of Daniel and 
Mose Boone, settled in Grassy Valley, back six miles from 



206 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the Ohio. Dennis Pennington came the same year. Be- 
fore the close of 1807, Samuel Pfrimmer, Davis Floyd, 
Thomas Posey, and Thomas Wilson had formed a numerous 
neighborhood. Frederick Mauck had established a ferry 
at what is now Mauckport as early as 1808. No ferry on 
the lower Ohio was used by more emigrants than this. Gen- 
eral Harrison bought a farm at Wilson's Spring near Blue 
river and erected a mill in 1806. Corydon was laid out in 
1808 by R. M. Heth. 

It was from this stream of immigration crossing at 
Mauckport and Oatman's Ferry that the first settlers of 
Floyd county, Robert La Follette and Patrick Shields, came. 
They located at Georgetown in 1804, at least eight years 
before the Scribner Brothers laid out the town of New 
Albany. 

Some time during the year 1805-6 Jesse Vawter led a 
small company across the Ohio at what is now Madison 
and opened up a settlement on the hill back of the town. 
This was six years before John Paul entered the townsite 
of Madison and laid off the town. 

Other settlers went deeper into the forests of Indiana, 
and, in a few years, the second tier of counties began to 
fill up. A party of hunters, led by John Kimberlin and 
his two sons, settled on Kimberlin creek in Scott county 
early in the year 1805, and erected a cabin of white oak 
logs. William Flemming, Peter Storms, Hiram Wingate, 
and William Estil are some of those who followed in the 
succeeding years. In 1810 was laid out the town of Lex- 
ington, one of the oldest towns in the State. Here a bank 
was established in 1815 and a paper published, called the 
Western Eagle. 

In the same year in which these early settlers located 
in Scott county other immigrants were crossing the Ohio 
at points in Warrick county. Among the first was Bailey 
Anderson, for whom Anderson township was named. Hud- 
son Hargrave, Joseph DeForest, Ratliff Boone, for whom 
Boone township was named, Thomas Campbell, for whom 
Campbell township was named, and John Hart, for whom 
Hart township was named, followed at about the same time. 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 207 

These men went to Henderson, Kentucky, to have their 
wheat ground into flour. Booneville was established in 
1818 and named for Ratliff Boone. 

The first settlers of Daviess county were from the Caro- 
linas and Kentucky. In 1806 came Eli Hawkins from 
South Carolina, He located near Maysville. A small part 
of western Daviess county was included in the Vincennes 
survey, the lines running at an angle of forty-five degrees 
from north to south. On these lands along the east bank 
of White river most of the early settlers located. Daviess 
was one of the counties most exposed to Indian depreda- 
tions. To protect its fifty-five families five forts were built 
during the winer of 1811 and 1812. These were named 
from their location, Purcell's, Comer's, Ballow's, Coleman's, 
and Hawkins's. Three forts were added during the war 
— Flora's, Palmer's, and Jones's. This is mentioned, not 
because it was a condition peculiar to Daviess county, but 
because it was the common thing in all the counties settled 
before 1812. There were from six to fifteen families gath- 
ered around each fort. Each fort, therefore, had a garri- 
son of about twenty rifles. Remains of similar forts are 
yet to be seen on the west side of White river in Knox 
county. All these forts were in Knox county at that time, 
since Daviess was not organized till 1817, at which time 
Washington was located and platted. The settlers men- 
tioned came by the Wabash and White rivers. 

The early settlers of Posey county, the Duckworths, Mc- 
Faddens, Hutchinsons, Lynns, and the Wagners, came from 
Virginia, Carolina, Kentucky, and Pennsylvania. The 
dense forests of Posey county were fine hunting grounds, 
but they looked rather formidable to the prospective farm- 
ers. The settlers located about 1807. Audibon, the nat- 
uralist, was a frequent visitor in this county. Evansville 
was settled by Col. Hugh McGary in 1812. 

About the same year in which the hunters were pene- 
trating the wilderness of Posey county, others were making 
their way into what came to be Gibson county. Here came 
William Herrington, Jesse Montgomery, Daniel Postman, 
first judge of the county, Robert M. Evans, for whom 



208 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Evansvilie is named, James Hazelton, Thomas Chapman, 
who was the founder of Princeton, and others. The first 
settlement was a short distance west of where Princeton 
now stands. Princeton was laid out in 1814. 

In 1806 the settlers braved the hills of Crawford county, 
settling in the northern part. It seems that the first set- 
tlers were a part of a large colony that scattered over the 
northern part of Harrison county and the southern part of 
Orange and Washington counties. Among those who came 
to Crawford county were Thomas Stroud, E. E. Morgan, 
William McKee, and William Frakes. In 1807 came Peter 
Frakes, William Van Winkle, John Peckinpaugh, followed 
shortly by Captain Posey, the Conrads, the Clarks, and the 
Leavenworths. The latter laid out the town of Leaven- 
Vv'-orth in 1818. This county was a great hunting ground 
at that time. 

About the same time the settlers crossed to the east 
bank of the White river in Daviess, others crossed the Ohio 
at various points in what is now Perry county, and so closed 
up the last gap in the front of the invading army. The 
Perry county pioneers located on the Ohio or nearby on 
the tributary creeks. William Taylor and Joseph Wright 
settled at Rome, Thomas and Rev. Charles Polk in Polk's 
Bottom just below. In 1811 Mr. Richardson built a grist 
mill on Deer creek. Uriah Cummings built a sawmill on 
Poison in 1812. This does not intend to mean that these 
were the first white persons in the county, for the head- 
waters of Deer creek. Poison, Anderson, and Oil creeks 
were fine game ranges, to say nothing of the natural shel- 
ters of their overhanging cliff's, some of which will shelter 
a regiment of men in any kind of weather. There were 
springs of pure water and hills free from malaria and 
"milk sickness." Here hunters and squatters had lived 
for at least ten years before the first land entries were 
made. 

It is not possible much further to note the progress of 
this invading army of settlers, crossing the Ohio into Indi- 
ana or entering by the Ohio river from the east. Its picket 
lines kept pushing on into the northern wilderness along 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 209 

the valleys or going boldly through the forest where there 
was no stream. 

In 1810 its outposts were in Lawrence and Monroe coun- 
ties. In the same year settlers located down at Mt. Pleas- 
ant in Martin county. A year later others located in and 
about Vallonia in Jackson county. They crept steadily up 
the Whitewater, appearing in Fayette county in 1813, in 
Ripley in 1814, in Jennings in 1815, Randolph in 1816, in 
Hancock, Rush and Shelby in 1818. The western wing 
pushed up the Wabash and White rivers, settling at Spen- 
cer in 1815; at Gosport almost the same time; at Terre 
Haute in 1816 ; in Greene county in 1817 ; in Morgan county 
in 1819; in Vermillion in 1816, and in Clinton in 1818. ^ 

The first results of the War of 1812 on the development 
of Indiana Territory were disastrous. The inroads of the 
Indians during 1812 broke up many settlements. The 
Maria Creek Settlement in Knox county, the frontier then 
on the Wabash, was abandoned. The women and children 
were taken back to Vincennes or further south, some being 
taken back to their old homes across the Ohio.- The settlers 
around the forks of White river were huddled together in 
the little forts. Their friends back at home, who were 
making preparations to come out to the new country, were 
warned of the danger and instructed to stay at home till 
the storm subsided. Around Vallonia a large number of 
settlers were held, protected by the rangers, and a spacious 
fort, though even from here many withdrew to Clark 
county, and it was thought for a time that the little colony 
would break up. The Pigeon Roost Massacre drove the 

1 The best siugle reference on the early settlements of Indiana is in 
Illustrated Historical Atlas of Indiana, puhlished in 1876 by Bas- 
kin, Forster & Co. The various county histories give valuable data, 
such as Young's History of Wayne County; a History of Dearborn 
County; a History of Knox and Daviess Counties, and others have 
valuable reminiscenses and facts drawn from the county records. No 
comprehensive first-hand study of the subject has been made. Much 
valuable material is contained in papers read at "Old Settlers' Meet- 
ings," but no collection of these is available. Waldo Mitchell, "Growth 
of Indiana, 1812-1820," Indiana Magazine of History, December, 1914; 
Carlos T. McCarty. "Hindostan, a Pioneer Town." Indiana Magazine 
of History, June, 1914. 

2 Indiana Magazine of History. "Polke Memoirs." Vol. X, No. 1. 



210 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

pioneers of Clark and Jefferson counties back on the pro- 
tection of the Ohio river settlements. On the Whitewater 
the Quakers maintained an advanced position in Wayne 
county, protected by such small stockades as Boyd's Fort. 
Few if any of these settlers had advanced beyond the line 
of the National Road. Salisbury was the center of this 
settlement. 

It will be noticed that the frontier line of 1812 extended 
from Vincennes east almost to Jefferson county, thence 
following roughly the line of the Twelve Mile Purchase 
north of the line of the National Road. Except for the 
finger of settlement running up the Whitewater Valley the 
line of settlement is pretty accurately marked now by the 
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. To the north of this line 
no white persons lived, except, perhaps, a few traders 
around such posts as Fort Wayne, Andersontown, and 
Terre Haute. 

The editor of Niles' Register, August 6, 1814, in sum- 
ming up the situation of the West, called Indiana a great 
tract of rich land, well watered by such fine streams as 
the Ohio, Wabash, White, and Whitewater rivers, which 
but for Indian interference would long before have had a 
numerous population. The census of 1810 showed 24,526 
persons, of whom only 237 were slaves. 

§ 39 Removal of the Territorial Capital to Corydon 

From the time John Gibson arrived at Vincennes, July 
4, 1800, to May 1, 1813, that town was the capital of Indi- 
ana territory. There was no hope even among its own citi- 
zens that it would remain the permanent State capital. It 
seems to have been the general understanding that the 
Northwest Territory would be devided by the great Miami 
and the Wabash. This would inevitably leave Vincennes on 
the boundary. As long, however, as Indiana Territory in- 
cluded the Illinois Country, Vincennes would remain the 
capital. With the organization of Illinois Territory Feb- 
ruary 3, 1809, the balance of power in the Indiana As- 



212 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

sembly shifted to the east and the struggle for the removal 
of the capital began. 

The Territorial Assembly, however, soon found an ob- 
stacle in its road. The governor, who owned valuable 
property in Vincennes, had an absolute veto on all its bills. 
This was no merely imaginary danger, for Deputy 
Jennings presented a memorial to Congress January 20, 
1812, complaining of the arbitrary conduct of the governor 
in vetoing a bill to change the location of the capital. 

The matter of relocation came up at the 1810 session 
of the Assembly. Lawrenceburg, Vevay, Madison, Jeffer- 
sonville, and Corydon were aspirants. The question was 
referred to a committee instructed to select a new site. 

This site was to be north of Driftwood, east of White 
river and at least twenty miles from the Indiana boundary 
which then ran from near the present site of Covington to 
a point about twenty miles east of where Mitchell now 
stands. It was to be as nearly central as possible to Green- 
ville (Ohio), Madison, New Harmony, and Covington, the 
four corners of the inhabited part of the territory. If the 
committee failed to agree it was to lay its evidence before 
the governor, who was then to make the final selection. A 
petition was at once prepared and sent to Congress asking 
a donation of four sections of land on the main branch of 
White river.-' 

Nothing came of this effort. The War of 1812 pre- 
vented a meeting of the Assembly during 1812. As soon 
as the Assembly of 1813 convened the fight for relocation 
was again taken up. Madison, through its representative, 
William McFarland, of Lexington, offered $10,000 as a 
bonus. The vote on this in the Council stood four to four. 
James Dili, of Dearborn, then submitted a proposition from 
Lawrenceburg, and a bill to make that place the capital 
passed to third reading before it failed. Vevay was tried, 
and the vote stood five to three against it. Charlestown 
failed by the same vote. Clarksville received two votes. 
Jeffersonville received a tie vote. Corydon got a tie vote 

3 Annals, Eleventh Cong., 508. Ibid. 748, for favoriible report of 
cougressional committee. 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 213 

also. The eastern members controlled the House of Rep- 
resentatives and chose Madison. The Council would not 
vote for it, however, and in a conference Corydon was se- 
lected. The act bears date March 11, 1813, and further 
provided that officers and offices should be at Corydon by 
May 1, 1813.4 

§ 40 The Enabling Act 

Since the outbreak of the War of 1812 there had been 
agitation among the inhabitants of the territory for a State 
government. Part of this was due to a feeling that the 
federal government was not active enough in protecting 
the border. Part was due to political dissatisfaction. It 
was felt that the rights of suffrage were too much re- 
stricted, and that through the appointment of sheriffs the 
governor had too much influence in elections. Numerous 
petitions to Congress indicate this sentiment."" 

January 1, 1812, Jennings presented a petition drawn 
by the General Assembly asking that Indiana be made a 
State. January 13, the Speaker laid before Congress a pro- 
test against the above petition signed by James Dill and 
Peter Jones, members of the House of Representatives of 
Indiana Territory. March 31 Jennings reported favorably 
on the petition, and offered a resolution that Indiana be 
admitted as soon as a census should show it to have a popu- 
lation of 35,000.*' Again, on February 1, 1815, Jennings 
presented a petition from inhabitants of Indiana Territory 
asking admission. The request was laid on the table with- 
out discussion. 

The question, however, was discussed throughout In- 

4 The .Journals of the General Assembly for 1810 and 1811 are in 
the Vincenues Western Sun. Those of 1813 are in the Seci'etary of 
State's office, in manuscript form; that of the House in the hand of 
William Hendricks; that of the Council in the hand of Benjamin Parke. 
Danger of Vincennes being captured by the Indians may have hastened 
the removal of the capital. Cf. Waldo Mitchell, "Growth of Indiana. 
1812-1820," in Indiana Magazitie of History, December, ini4. The re- 
moval took place soon after the disaster on the river Raisin. 

•""' See especially report by Jennings, Annuls TiceJfth Cony.. 1284. 

^Annals, Twelfth Cong., 607 and 749. 

(15) 



214 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

diana during the ensuing summer. Money was piling up 
in the land offices at Vincennes and especially at Jefferson- 
ville. A continuous fleet of boats floated down the Ohio 
from Pittsburg, a goodly number of which tied up on the 
Indiana bank of the river, or else were poled up its tribu- 
tary streams. Every one felt that there must be near the 
necessary 60,000 population, the minimum requirement for 
a State government under the Ordinance of 1787. The 
newspapers at Vincennes, Corydon, Lexington and Madi- 
son were full of advertisements of new towns being laid 
out. Settlements were forming right up to the Indian 
Boundary all the way across the State and the ubiquitous 
squatters were crossing over by hundreds. The White- 
water Valley, it was thought, had 20,000 settlers; Clark 
and Washington counties had at least 15,000; Harrison 
had upwards of 6,000; while not less than 20,000 lived on 
the Wabash or the lower course of White river. The 
Western Eagle, of Lexington, from statistics in eight coun- 
ties and estimates in six others, gave the total population, 
November, 1815, as 68,084." 

The General Assembly that met December 4-28, 1815. 
included many of the best men in the territory. It lost no 
time in framing a petition for Statehood. This memorial 
appeared in Niles' Register, December 14, but was not pre- 
sented in the House of Representatives till December 28, 
1815, and in the Senate till January 2, 1816. The memorial 
was signed by Dennis Pennington, of Corydon, Speaker, 
and by David Robb, of Princeton, president of the Council. 
After reciting that the territory had reached that stage of 
growth at which, by the terms of the Ordinance of 1787, 
it was entitled to a State government, the memorialists 
asked for an election on the first Monday of May to elect 
delegates to a constitutional convention which might de- 
termine whether it was expedient to form a State constitu- 
tion. 

The memorialists also asked for seven per cent of the 
land sales for State use, for a congressional township as an 
endowment for a State University, for an academy, for the 

"' Quoted in Niles' Register, Noveiuber 4 and 11. 1815. 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 215 

coal mines and salt licks, and finally for a donation six 
miles square on which to locate a State capital. 

The memorial was referred to a committee, of which 
Jonathan Jennings was chairman. This committee, 
through its chairman, reported by bill January 5, 1816. In 
the Annals there is included in Jennings' report a letter 
from William Hendricks, dated February 24, 1816, giving 
the voters of the State as 12,112 and the total population 
63,897.^ This census had been taken by the listers of the 
various counties and certified by the county clerk of the 
General Assembly December 4, 1815. 

The vote on the admission of Indiana in the House of 
Representatives stood 108 yeas, 3 nays. The bill was re- 
ported to the Senate March 30. April 2 it was referred to 
the same committee that had in charge the enabling bill for 
the territory of Mississippi. At this time Senator David 
Daggett, of Connecticut, asked that the committee ascer- 
tain the number of free inhabitants in each of the terri- 
tories. April 3 the bill for the admission of Indiana was 
taken from the special committee and given to a committee 
headed by Senator Jeremiah Morrow, of Ohio. The next 
day this committee reported favorably, Senator Morrow 
submitting at the time a census report on the population 
of the territory of Indiana. It was finally passed April 13. 
The next legislative day, Monday, April 15, the House con- 
curred in the Senate amendments and the bill went to the 

8 Voters Population 

Clark County 1,387 7,150 

Dearborn County 902 4,424 

Franklin County 1,430 7,370 

Gibson County 1,100 5,330 

Harrison County 1,056 6,975 

Jefferson County 874 4,270 

Knox County 1,391 8,068 

Periy County 350 1,720 

Posey County 320 1,619 

Switzerland County 377 1,832 

Warrick County 280 1,415 

Washington County 1,420 7,317 

Wayne County 1,225 6,407 

Total 12,112 63,897 



216 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

President, by whom it was approved April 19. It is inter- 
esting to note how closely the fate of this bill was linked 
with that for the admission of Mississippi. The two were 
passed by the House at the same sitting and without inter- 
vening business. There were only three opposing votes in 
the House, Goldsborough, of Maryland, Lewis and Ran- 
dolph of Virginia, on the bill to admit Indiana and 53 on 
that to enable Mississippi. There was no division in the 
Senate. 

Congress left the duty of naming the new State to its 
inhabitants. Its boundaries were laid down as they now 
are, the only change from the territorial boundary being 
the additions of a strip ten miles wide across the northern 
border, and some small areas east of the Wabash between 
Vincennes and Terre Haute. 

The act set Monday, May 13, as the day for an election 
of delegates to a constitutional convention. The apportion- 
ment of delegates was the same as that asked for in the 
petition.'-^ The qualifications for voting were legal age, 
payment of taxes, and the usual residence restrictions. No 
property qualification was required. Otherwise the elec- 
tion was held as ordinary elections for members of the 
House of Representatives. 

The members thus elected were to convene at Corydon 
Monday, June 10, and, if deemed expedient, form a con- 
stitution, or order a new election of delegates. The only 
restriction on the work of the convention was that the new 
constitution should be republican and exclude slavery, the 
restriction laid down in the federal constitution and in the 
Ordinance of 1787. 

Besides the above. Congress made five donations to the 

9 The appoi'tioument was as folloAvs: 

Clark n Perry 1 

Dearborn 3 Posey 1 

Franklin 5 Switzerland 1 

Gibson 4 Warrick 1 

Harrison 5 Washington 5 

.Tefiferson 3 Wayne 4 

Knox 5 

Total 43 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 217 

prospective State, conditioned on their acceptance by the 
convention : 

The first was the donation of section sixteen of the 
public land out of every congressional township for the use 
of public schools. The second was the donation of all the 
salt springs in the territory to and for the use of the 
people. The third was the donation of five per cent of the 
net proceeds of the land sales in the territory, three per 
cent to be used by the General Assembly for opening roads 
in the State, and two per cent by the federal government 
to build roads to the State. The fourth was a donation 
of one entire township for the use of a seminary of learning 
— the State University grant. The fifth was a donation of 
four sections of land as a site for a State capital. i° 

§ 41 The Constitutional Convention of 1816 

An announcement of the passage of the Enabling Act 
reached Vincennes in time to be published in the Western 
Sun, May 3. The election of delegates was set for May 
13, leaving only ten days intervening, time for only one 
issue of the paper. The Western Sun rightly criticised 
Jennings for the haste. ^^ An explanation, favorable to 
Jennings, was that when the bill was drawn in December 
it was thought it would pass early in January, thus giving 
the voters of Indiana at least three months for the can- 
vass. The delay was caused largely by the opposition to 
the Mississippi bill. 

The editor of the Western Sun placed several men in 
nomination, but frankly added that he had not seen any 
of them and did not know if any of them would serve. 

Very little evidence has come down to us concerning 
this election. If there was any concerted action, any or- 
ganization, any definite issue before the people, all trace 
of it has disappeared. The men selected were representa- 
tive of the best talent in the State. The previous General 

^'0 Annals, 14 Congress, 1.S41 ; Dunn. Infliana, 417; Dillon, History of 
Indiana, 554; Vincennes Western Sun, under pi-oper .cl:(te: Statutes at 
Large, 1816, Scss. 1, ch. 57. 

11 Western Sun, May 3, 1S16. 



218 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Assembly was represented in the convention by over half 
its members. Twenty-three of them subsequently served in 
the State Senate; seventeen served in the House of Repre- 
sentatives; Jonathan Jennings served two terms as gov- 
ernor; Jennings, James Noble and Robert Hanna became 
United States senators; Jennings and William Graham 
became representatives in Congress; Benjamin Parke, 
James Scott and John Johnson became distinguished judges, 
the former in the United States circuit court, the two latter 
in the State supreme court; Daniel C. Lane served seven 
years as State Treasurer; John Badolet was in charge of 
the land oifice at Vincennes; William Polke was Indian 
agent at Fort Wayne ; at least a dozen of them were preach- 
ers; a smaller number were lawyers. So far as the evi- 
dence at hand shows, there was not a bad man in the list. 
They were not only a creditable convention, but personally 
were creditable to the voters who chose them. It does not 
seem probable that even a majority of them could have been 
partisans to any man or party. Badolet was the Swiss 
companion of Albert Gallatin; John DePauw was the son 
of a companion of Lafayette; Hugh Cull was a Methodist 
circuit rider; Charles Polke was a Baptist preacher and 
the founder of Baptist churches, as were also Ezra Ferris 
and William Polke; Frederick Rappe was the adopted son 
of the founder of New Harmonie. William Hendricks, the 
first representative of the State in Congress, and its second 
governor, was the secretary of the convention. 

The convention was in session from Monday, June 10, 
to Saturday, June 29, eighteen working days. The journal 
of the convention gives only the most meager details. The 
work of forming a constitution was distributed to commit- 
tees. There was some discussion, no doubt, over the slav- 
ery and suffrage sections, but the Enabling Act left them 
no discretion in the former. 

The constitution was not submitted to the voters for 
ratification. The president of the convention, Jonathan 
Jennings, was directed to issue to the county sheriffs writs 
of an election to be held August 5, under the old election 
laws, for the choice of a governor, lieutenant governor, 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 219 

members of the General Assembly, sheriffs and coroners. 
It was the harvest season of the year and many of the 
members were anxious to get home. The crowd of fifty 
men taxed heavily the tavern accommodations of the vil- 
lage of Corydon. There was every inducement for com- 
pleting the work as soon as possible. In this regard it 
stands in contrast to the convention of 1851, with its two 
thick volumes of talk. 

The two senators and the representatives appeared at 
the opening of Congress, December 2, when the Senate, by 
resolution December 6, and the House, by resolution intro- 
duced by William Henry Harrison, December 9, declared 
the State a member of the Union. ^ - 

As would be inferred from the character of the mem- 
bers of the convention and the brevity of the session, there 
was nothing novel in the constitution. The political theory 
of these men was somewhat more democratic than that 
advocated by Jefferson. The constitution as finally adopted 
was a judicious compound of the constitutions of Ohio, 
Kentucky, and the United States. The first article, which 
was a bill of rights, restated the fundamental maxims of 
English government in almost the exact words of the Ohio 
law. 

Article II, dealing with the separation of powers, which 
is an exact copy of article I of the Kentucky constitution, 
divided the powers into executive, legislative and judicial. 
There is only one different word — "Indiana" is used in 
place of "Kentucky." 

Article III, dealing with the legislative department, is 
a copy almost verbatim of the Ohio constitution. The date 

^- AiiiKils, Foiiiiecnth Cong., Twentieth Session. No cletjiiled study of 
the roiivention of 1816 li:is ever been made. Dillon and Dunn give a 
fevr pjiges to a bare outline of its work as gleaned from the scant record 
of the "Journal." The "Journal" was kept by William Hendricks, the 
secretary. No record was kept of the discussions in committee. There 
is evidence that a great deal of the short sessions was occupied by dif- 
ferent members in laying political plans. The "Journal" has been recent- 
ly reprinted in the 1912 Indiana Bar Association Report. This report 
al.so contains an al>le article on the Convention of 1816, by W. W. Thorn- 
ton, 



220 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

for State election is the first Monday of August, in prefer- 
ence to the Ohio date, which was on the second Tuesday of 
October. Representatives were to be chosen annually, as 
in Ohio, but senators were to serve three years, plainly a 
compromise between the two year term of Ohio and the 
four year term of Kentucky. The qualifications of repre- 
sentatives, 21 years of age, and senators, 25 years of age, 
were lower than in either State. Both had to be taxpayers, 
the same as in Ohio. 

The voting qualifications were expressed in the same 
words as in the Ohio law, the voter being required to be 21 
years old, and one year a resident. 

Judged from our time, there were remarkably few offi- 
cers to be chosen at public election. They were the mem- 
bers of the General Assembly, governor, lieutenant gov- 
ernor, associate circuit judges, sheriffs and coroners; the 
coroner and lieutenant governor being merely emergency 
oflficers to fill possible vacancies. Only three offices were 
thus filled by popular election, legislator, governor and 
sheriflC. 

In harmony with the spirit of the times, nearly all 
power was placed in the hands of the General Assembly. 
The governor had only a suspensive veto, which could be 
overcome by a majority of each House. He appointed a few 
officers, principally judges of the supreme court, but always 
by and with the advice and approval of the Senate. All 
circuit judges, and the secretary, auditor and treasurer of 
State were chosen by the General Assembly. 

The most notable innovation in the Indiana constitu- 
tion was Article IX, dealing with the subject of education. 
It has been noted that all the material differences between 
the Indiana and other constitutions were in favor of a 
wider democracy. Ohio had taken a short, halting step in 
the direction of public education, but the Indiana conven- 
[/' tion is entitled to the distinction of having first recognized 
the governmental obligation of educating all its citizens. 
Of all the sections of the constitution the one requiring that 
the General Assembly provide by law for a general system 



FROM TERRITORY TO STATE 221 

of education, ascending in a regular scale, from township 
schools to a State university, wherein tuition shall be gratis 
and equally open to all, was most democratic, and forward 
looking. It took a century to put this article into success- 
ful operation. 13 

^^ Journal of Constitutional Convention of 1816; Revised Latcs of In- 
diana, 1824; Ben Perley Poore, Constitutions and Charters; Laics of 
Indiana, 1817; Thorpe, Constitutions. 



CHAPTER X 

the government at corydon, 1816-1825 

§ 42 The New Constitution in Operation 

The summer of 1816 was a busy time with the voters 
and politicians of Indiana. The news of the passing of the 
Enabling Act reached the territory about May 1. The elec- 
tion of delegates to the constitutional convention was held 
May 13. The convention sat from the 10th to the 29th of 
June. The regular State and county election was held 
August 5, and the First General Assembly convened at 
Corydon November 4, 1816. Jonathan Jennings was the 
central figure in all this activity. He had been the delegate 
in Congress in charge of the Enabling Act; he was a dele- 
gate in the constitutional convention ; presided over its de- 
liberations; as its president it became his duty to issue 
writs of election and put the constitution into active opera- 
tion ; and in the campaign he was the leading candidate. 

The election of August 5, 1816, was warmly contested 
in some parts of the State. The Vincennes Western Sun, 
July 20, has ten columns devoted to letters of candidates. 
These letters make rather dull reading at present. There 
was no important issue before the people. All voters be- 
longed to the Republican Party and supported Monroe. An 
echo of the old-time struggle between the Wabash and Ohio 
settlements appeared in the campaign between Jennings 
and Governor Thomas Posey. That there was some spirit 
in this contest is shown by the number of votes cast. Jen- 
nings received 5,211 to 3,934 for Posey, — a total of 9,145 
votes out of a possible 12,112 shown in the enumeration 
less than a year previous. In the race for lieutenant gov- 
ernor only 7,474 votes were cast, of which Christopher Har- 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 223 

rison, of Salem, received 6,570. In the race for Congress, 
William Hendricks defeated Allen D. Thoih, receiver of 
public money at Jeffersonville, and George R. C. Sullivan, 
an attorney of Vincennes, by decisive majorities. Sullivan 
withdrew from the race two days before the election, in the 
hope of throwing his support to Thom, but the announce- 
ment did not reach most of the counties till after the elec- 
tion. 

The first session of the General Assembly met at Cory- 
don November 4, 181G, and remained in session till January 
3, 1817. It was fortunate for the new State that so many 
good men were returned to the First Session, for the con- 
stitution had left the organization of the State government 
very largely in the hands of the General Assembly. No 
State or local officers were elected by the people except the 
governor and sheriff and a deputy for each in case of emer- 
gency. By far the larger number of officers had to be pro- 
vided by the General Assembly. 

How much of its work was of this nature will be shown 
by a brief review. On the first day, November 4, the 
Houses organized, on the second, they met in joint session 
and canvassed the votes for governor and lieutenant gov- 
ernor, declaring Jennings and Harrison elected. On No- 
vember 8 the Houses again met together and chose James 
Noble and Waller Taylor to represent the State in the 
United States Senate. November 16 William H. Lilly was 
elected auditor of State, and Daniel C. Lane treasurer of 
State. There was some tendency shown to parcel out the 
offices among the members but this was soon stopped by a 
vote of the House, which expressed it as the belief of that 
body that it would be a violation of the constitution to elect 
one of its own members to a State office. Robert A. New 
was chosen as secretary of State. November 14 the Houses, 
again in joint session, chose Jesse L. Holman, Thomas H. 
Blake and Joseph Bartholomew to cast the vote of the State 
for James Monroe for President. December 20, in joint 
session, the General Assembly chose Benjamin Parke judge 
of the first circuit court, David Raymond, judge of the sec- 
ond, and John Test judge of the third. Not only was it 



224 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

necessary to elect these officers but to outline and define the 
work of the various offices. 

The constitution recognized the existence of township 
government and assumed that it would continue. In one 
section it provided that a competent number of justices be 
elected by the qualified electors for a term of five years. ^ 
In another place it provided that all town and to^vnship 
officers be appointed in such manner as shall be directed 
by law.'- 

It was made the duty of the board of commissioners of 
the county to divide each county into a suitable number of 
townships and order an election to be held to choose jus- 
tices, not to exceed three, for each township. These jus- 
tices were to be commissioned by the governor. At the sug- 
gestion of the board of commissioners the sheriff was 
authorized to appoint an election inspector for each town- 
ship, who might, if he thought necessary, divide the town- 
ship into voting precincts.-' 

The constable of the township was made the ministerial 
officer of the justice's court. He was appointed annually 
by the county board. The justices had county-wide juris- 
diction over petty crimes and misdemeanors, and township- 
wide jurisdiction over civil cases involving not over fifty 
dollars.^ 

The board of county commissioners was directed to ap- 
point a necessary number of freeholders in each town- 
ship to supervise the laying out and repairing of the high- 
ways. For the road-working every male person between 
the ages of eighteen and fifty was liable for not more than 
six days' work.'' The commissioners were also empowered 
to appoint a lister in each township to do the work now 
done by the township assessor.'' Then, for fear the legisla- 
tors had left out some detail in the scheme of local govern- 

1 Constitution, Art. V. Sec. V2. 

2 Constitution, Art. XI, Sec. 15. 
^ Laws of Indiana, 1817, eh. 11. 
^ Latcs of Indiana. 1817, ch. 4. 

o Laws of Indiana, 1817, ch. A'lIT. 
6 Laws of Indiana, 1817, ch. XIX. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 225 

ment, the commissioners were authorized to do and transact 
any and all county business not provided for." 

An unforeseen business soon developed in the case of 
poor relief. A law of the next General Assembly directed 
the county commissioners to appoint two overseers of the 
poor in every township, whose duty it should be to look 
after the worthy paupers. This was done by the overseers 
by auctioning off each individual pauper to the lowest bid- 
der, that is, to the person who would care for him for the 
smallest amount. 

Children of the poor and orphans were bound out as 
apprentices, boys until twenty-one years of age, girls until 
eighteen. Vagrants, so decreed by the court, were sold out 
to the highest bidder, the proceeds of his work, if any, going 
to those dependent upon him, the balance going to the 
vagrant after he had served out his nine months' indenture. 

The constitution dealt briefly with the county: Article 
XI, section ten, provided that a recorder might be elected 
for each county if the circuit court clerk was unable to do 
the work ; Article XII, section eight, provided for the elec- 
tion of a sheriff and coroner for each county. The General 
Assembly was given power to create and organize counties 
but no specific form of county organization was laid down. 

The First General Assembly constructed a simple sys- 
tem of commissioner government for the county. The form 
was almost the same as that of the present. There were 
three commissioners chosen for three year terms, one retir- 
ing each year. The circuit court clerk was clerk of the 
board, a duty now performed by the county auditor. The 
sheriff was, and still is, the ministerial officer of the board. 
The commissioners had control over the county affairs, 
levying county taxes and paying out the county money, con- 
trolling county roads and attending to and owning county 
property.'' 

The board was authorized to appoint a county treasurer, 
to receive, care for, and pay out on order, all county reve- 
nues, procure and keep correct a set of legal weights and 

■J" Laii-s of Indiana, 1817, ch. XXVII. 
8 Laws of Indiana, 1817, eh. XV. 



226 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

measures, appoint fence viewers, pound keepers, viewers to 
lay out new roads, select grand and petit jurors, appoint 
superintendents of school sections, election inspectors, poor 
overseers, and later to establish ferries and taverns.'^ It 
was no easy office in a new country. 

The strongest department of our early territorial and 
State government was the judiciary. During the territorial 
era, however, the system had become unduly complicated, 
and in one or two particulars, was not working well. There 
had been disclosed a ridiculous inconsistency in the appel- 
late court. The old territorial judges, three in number, 
went on circuit, and as circuit judges they often sat to- 
gether. On appeal, although all three might sit together, 
one was a quorum and thus one might overrule a decision 
given on circuit by all three; or one as supreme judge 
might overrule himself as a circuit judge; or, a lawyer 
might appeal a case and be sustained by one judge and the 
next year be reversed on the identical question by the other 
judge. 

The Territorial General Assembly had tried to remedy 
this, and, in the constitution, it was effectually cured by 
giving the supreme court appellate jurisdiction only and re- 
quiring two of the three justices to concur in all decisions. 
They were not allowed to hold circuit court and hence 
would be under no necessity of overruling themselves. 

The State was divided into three circuits, in each of 
which a circuit court was organized. This court consisted 
of three judges, a president judge, appointed by the Gen- 
eral Assembly, and two associate justices, elected by the 
voters of the county. It was a strange mixture of State and 
local government. Thus the First Circuit, composed of 
Knox, Gibson, Warrick, Posey, Perry, Pike and Daviess 
counties, had one president judge, Benjamin Parke, and 
fourteen associate justices, two for each county. The presi- 
dent judge was usually a skilled lawyer, but the associates 
more often knew little of the law. They were rather se- 
lected for their general worth and standing in the com- 

9 Laifs of Indiana, 1S17, ch. XVII. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 227 

munity. They were regarded as the leading men of the 
county and were often politicians. 

Below the circuit courts was an army of justices of the 
peace, as stated under "Township Government." The sys- 
tem was given a modern appearance by lopping off all ex- 
traordinary tribunals of the common law, such as quarter 
sessions, chancery, probate, and other special courts. In 
place of these the circuit courts were endowed with com- 
mon law and equity powers. A beginning was made also 
in simplifying the pleadings, though many of the ludicrous 
old writs of English common law survived to the great joy 
of the special pleader at the bar. The work of the conven- 
tion and of the First General Assembly indicate the pres- 
ence in these bodies of good lawyers. Chief of these, no 
doubt, were Isaac Blackford, Benjamin Parke, James Scott, 
John Johnson and Joseph Holman. 

The organization of the courts was carried still farther 
by the Second General Assembly, which not only laid down 
the main lines of the civil code of the State as it exists to- 
day, but added a criminal code which received few changes 
except in the manner of punishment until after 1850.1^ 
The whipping post, as a means of punishment, still dis- 
graced the State, though the substitution of fines and im- 
prisonment was noticeable in the code of 1818.^^ All bar- 
barous punishments disappeared in the code of 1824. i- 

^(^ Laws of ImUana. 1818, ch. I-XIII inclusive. 

iiGompiire article by Judge D. D. P.nnta. IniUnwi Mdc/dzine of His- 
tory, December ]91o. 234. 

12 Vincennes CenUnel May 6. 1820: '"On Thursday last the minds of 
our citizens were shocked by the shameful spectacle of a fellow citizen 
tied to a sign post and flogged lilve a dog under the sentence of the circuit 
court now sitting in our town. He was found guilty of a petty species 
of that Siime crime for wliich so many heroes and statesmen have been 
celebrated and for which their names have been given to posterity. 
The sight was truly disgusting and it was evident that the manly mind 
of the otiicer who executed the sentence revolted at the performance 
of that odious duty. The criminal code of Indiana is a disgrace to 
civilization and it ill becomes our lawyers to boast of their refinement, 
while they sanction this species of degrading brutality, or to laud 
their purgation from British brutality, while they hariior this relic of its 
foulest barbarism. Corporal punishments are worse than useless; for 
nine times out of ten they are fatal to the mind of the victim — he is 
lost to society — he sinks under a sense of shame; or is sensitive and 



228 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

In the State government the General Assembly was all- 
powerful. Many functions now performed by other agents 
were then retained as the duties of the General Assembly. 
It laid down new roads and streets and vacated old ones ; it 
chartered all municipal and private corporations from a 
county government to a county library; it licensed ferries 
and taverns, fixing rates of service in either case ; it elected 
United States senators and impeached squires; it char- 
tered a State bank, and granted divorces. 

The General Assembly met annually and its meeting 
constituted the chief political event in the year's history. 
The politicians of the State gathered to its meetings, the 
newspapers of the State burdened themselves, to the ex- 
clusion of all other news, with the minute details of the 
Legislative journals. The electioneering of candidates for 
the General Assembly was never ended. The candidates 
were present at the log-rolling in the spring and at the 
harvest in the summer; at the huskings in the fall they 
talked with their constituents about what the General As- 
sembly should do when it met; on muster days the candi- 
dates and more important politicians, usually under the im- 
posing title of "jinerall," reviewed the militia or led in the 
maneuvers. 

The executive department was reduced to a minimum. 
The governor, drawing the highest salary in the State, 
$1,000 per year, could be absent from his post for weeks at 
a time. The secretary of state, auditor of state, treasurer 
of state, with duties similar to those pertaining to their 
offices at present, were small clerks drawing salaries of 
$400 each annually. The supreme and circuit judges drew 
$700 per year, while members of the General Assembly 
were paid $2 per day. 

§ 43 Indians 

When Indiana was admitted into the Union the Indians 
still had a claim on about two-thirds of its soil. The In- 

revengeful : the petty felon becomes the lui nleiied ruffi.-ni. If guilty lie 
is then desi)er;ite, if innocent the scars on his shoulders keep knockinir 
at his heart and calling for satisfaction in a voice that is never mistaken 
or unheeded." 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 229 

dian Boundary line extended from a point on the west 
boundary of the State in Vermiiiion county, passing near 
Montezuma, in Parke county; Gosport, in Owen county; to 
Driftwood river, a few miles east of Brownstown. This 
was the famous "ten o'clock" line. From Brownstown the 
boundary led in a broken line northeast to Greenville, Ohio. 

During the summer of 1816 Benjamin Parke met the 
Weas and Kickapoos in council at Fort Harrison. They 
ceded a small strip of land on Vermillion river. The In- 
dians seemed in an accommodating mood and the agent was 
hopeful that they would consent to go beyond the Missis- 
sippi.^^ 

Later in the year 1816 ex-Governor Posey, Judge Parke 
and a man named Sharpe were commissioned to hold a 
council with the Miamis, Pottawattomies and Delav/ares. 
Nothing was accomplished at this time. Two years later 
Governor Jennings, Benjamin Parke, then federal judge 
for the district of Indiana, and Gen. Lewis Cass, governor 
of Michigan, met the tribes at St. Mary's, Ohio, and suc- 
ceeded in purchasing nearly all the land south of the Wa- 
bash. The Delawares agreed to take a grant of land be- 
yond the Mississippi, and the Weas, Kickapoos, Pottawat- 
tomies and Miamis, all having claims on the ceded terri- 
tory, agreed to withdraw to the north of the Wabash. This 
ceded land was commonly known in Indiana as the "New 
Purchase." Three years were given the Delawares in which 
to gather up their property and leave the State. In the fall 
of 1820 the remnant of this once powerful tribe, whose 
ancestors had received Henry Hudson, on the Hudson, and 
William Penn, on the Delaware, took up their western 
march, the disheartened train passing Kaskaskia about the 
middle of October.'^ 

In September, 1820, Judge Parke concluded negotiations 
by which the Kickapoos also abandoned the State, thus op- 
ening up the Wabash country as far north as the present 
site of Lafayette. 

^^ American State Papers; [lulian Affairs, II. 91; United States Stat- 
utes at Large, VII, 145. 

14 Vineeunes Centinel, November 4, 1820. 

(16) 



230 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The government had early recognized its obligations to 
aid the Indians, but though Congress had appropriated 
money liberally for the purpose, no lasting benefit had de- 
rived to the Indians. It was found impossible to regulate 
the trade between the white and red men so that the latter 
were treated fairly. In despair of regulating the inde- 
pendent traders by means of licenses and police, the gov- 
ernment, in 179G, had taken the business into its own 
hands. Agents for the various tribes were appointed and 
factories established where the Indians might buy and sell 
at a fair and uniform price. 

In 1806 a superintendent of the Indian trade was ap- 
pointed. This system was considered somewhat better than 
the old, but the condition of the Indians was little improved. 
The government factors were forbidden to sell whiskey to 
the natives, but unprincipled traders, most of them crimi- 
nal outcasts from the east, swarmed into the Indian coun- 
try, furnishing liquor to all V\^ho had anything to give in 
return, denouncing the government agents as robbers, and 
inciting the Indians to all kinds of deeds of violence on one 
another or to depredations on the settlers. The evidence 
is conclusive that for every Indian killed in war ten were 
killed in drunken brawls. The squaws were neglected and 
the papooses frozen and starved, that meat and furs might 
be carried to the nearest trading post and bartered for 
whiskey.^"' 

The condition of the Indians excited pity among most 
of the pioneers. Bands of dejected, hopeless, Indian va- 
grants from the Indian towns often visited the settlements, 
usually begging food or clothes. Many of the churches at- 
tempted to do something for them. 

On March 26, 1817, Isaac McCoy, a Baptist preacher of 
the Maria Creek Church, Knox county, wrote to the board 
of managers of the Baptist Missionary Convention of the 
United States, asking service, under its direction, among 
the pioneers beyond the Mississippi. Instead of sending 
him beyond the Mississippi the board sent him as a mis- 
sionary among the Wabash Indians of Indiana. 

15 American State Papers, Indian Affairs. 11, 70. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 231 

Mr. McCoy, his wife, and their seven small children, 
established a mission school in a hut in the forests of what 
is now Parke county. Gen. Thomas Posey, United States 
agent for the Weas, Miamis and Kickapoos, assisted. Mc- 
Coy accompanied the traders, who went early in 1818, to 
deliver the annuities of the government. The goods were 
placed on the ground and two Indians chosen to divide 
them. They drew cuts for first choice and then proceeded, 
taking piece about, until all articles were appropriated. 
The trader put whatever value he saw fit on the goods. 

The mission school was twenty miles from the nearest 
white settlement. Here, in a log hut, were gathered a 
dozen or so Indian children, ranging in age from five to 
twelve years. Mrs. McCoy took care of them just as she did 
her own children. All ate at the same table and slept in the 
same room with the missionary and his family. The larger 
number of the children were half breeds, children of white 
traders and Indian squaws. 

December 18, 1818, McCoy set off from his mission 
home on a tour of inspection. His journey led him across 
the State to Fort Wayne. In the neighborhood of the future 
cities of Crawfordsville and Thorntown the Indian huts 
were all abandoned, the Indians being gone on their hunt- 
ing trip. However, he found four French traders on that 
part of his journey. At the Delaware towns in Hamilton 
county he found a trader named Connor. 

Bending his course to the southeast, McCoy struck the 
Quaker Settlements in Wayne county. On the 15th, he 
reached the Indian Agency at Fort Wayne, kept by John 
Johnson. Mr. McCoy returned through the Delaware coun- 
try, visiting Captain Anderson at Andersontown. The cap- 
tain lived in some style. He had fifteen squaws hauling 
wood for him. They procured the wood at a distance of 
half a mile, tied it with thongs in large bundles, bound it 
on their backs and carried it to the chief's hut. At the 
close of the day's work the old squaws were courteously 
thanked and given a good feed. Most of the Delawares at 
this time lived in log huts, had cleared land, and had 



232 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

planted some fruit trees. They were making progress, but 
the "New Purchase" treaty had just been consummated 
and all were preparing to leave for the west, broken- 
hearted. 

The prevailing tone of McCoy's picture of these sav- 
ages is one of unmitigated squalor and debauchery that 
prevailed everywhere on account of the too frequent use of 
liquor by the unfortunate tribesmen. On one occasion a 
squaw was observed in a swamp digging roots for her chil- 
dren's breakfast. The weather was almost freezing cold, 
but she stood barefoot in the mud and water half knee 
deep. Strapped on her back, she carried a papoose not 
more than a few months old. On another occasion they 
came upon a squaw burying her young babe. The ground 
was frozen and she had cut a deep notch with a hatchet in 
a fallen tree. In this hole she placed the babe and laid some 
large pieces of wood over the top to keep the wild animals 
away. 

In 1820 the McCoys moved their mission to Fort Wayne. 
The goods and ten or twelve Indian children were placed in 
a small boat at Fort Harrison and poled up the Wabash, 
while the McCoys, husband, wife and their own children, 
together with fifteen head of cattle, forty-three hogs, two 
hired men and a guide, set out by a bridle path. It rained 
almost every day. The party slept on the bare ground, 
fortunate if they could find enough dry ground on which to 
sleep. The Indians along the route were drunk, as usual, 
having just returned from their winter's hunt. At the 
crossing of the Mississinewa the Indians were especially 
troublesome. One drunken wretch made an effort to mur- 
der McCoy. Another enjoyed himself by throwing a half 
rotten dog on Mrs. McCoy and the children. The trip was 
made, however, without mishap. A prosperous mission 
was built up. Later, October, 1822, the McCoys moved the 
mission to Niles, Michigan, and when the Indians were 
transported beyond the Mississippi the McCoys went 
along, ^s 

ic//Ks-/ory of the Baptinl Indian Missions. Isnac McCoy. Washing- 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 233 

§ 44 The First State Bank and the Ohio Falls Canals 

There was very little money, either specie or paper, in 
Indiana before the State was admitted into the Union in 
1816. The period just preceding 1816 was the worst in 
our history for "wildcat" banks. The charter of the First 
United States Bank expired in 1811, and the Second was 
not chartered until 1816, and during that time the "wild- 
cat" banks flourished. 

A "wildcat" bank was a very simple affair. In order 
to start a bank, the banker had only to have a supply of 
notes engraved and then open his bank in some convenient 
place. These banks, as a rule, received no deposits. They 
were open one day in the week or preferably two half 
days. The banker used every means to get his notes in cir- 
culation, frequently selling or loaning them at half their 
face value. If business prospered he would remain and 
redeem his notes; if not, he packed his grip with the re- 
maining notes and sought a more favorable field. Banks 
like this were established in territorial times at Brook- 
ville, Lexington and New Harmony. 

There was a demand, however, for more substantial 
banks ; and in answer to this the territorial legislature, sit- 
ting in Corydon in 1814, chartered two banks. One of them 
was to be located at Vincennes and the other at Madison. 
The ofllicers of the land ofiice at Vincennes were behind the 
former, and John Paul, founder of Madison and a hero of 
the George Rogers Clark campaign, was behind the latter. 
The charters, which were identical, were to run twenty 
years, and it was provided that all notes issued should be 
paid in hard money. The capital stock of the Madison bank 
was to be $750,000; that of Vincennes, at first $750,000, 
was later raised to $1,500,000. The Madison Bank, called 
the Farmers and Mechanics', was promptly organized by 

ton 1840; Indiana Magazine of Histoiy, March, 1914; American State 
Papers, Indian Affairs, II, 277; Vincennes Sun, September 1, 1821. 

The Moravian missionaries had established a station at Anderson- 
town on White riA'er and were attempting to teach the arts of peaceful 
life to the Indians. See J. P. Dunn, in Indiana Magazine of History, IX, 
73; also Dawson, Life of Harrison, II, This station lasted from 1801 
to 1806. 



234 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

John Paul, John Ritchie, Christopher Harrison, Henry Ris- 
tine, N. Hurst and D. Blakmore. This bank proceeded to 
make itself useful at once by redeeming the shin-plasters 
issued by the local merchants. It was the custom of the 
merchants to keep on hand a large amount of paper money, 
printed by themselves, in denominations of 6i/4, 121/2, 25, 
and 50 cents. There being no coin in circulation, the store- 
keepers handed this out in change. This the bank re- 
deemed in the currency of the Commonwealth Bank of Ken- 
tucky, when presented in amounts of one dollar or more. 

The notes of the Madison Bank were received at the land 
office at Brookville in payment for land until the Second 
United States Bank began its war on all private banks. 
During this time the Madison Bank held the enviable repu- 
tation of having furnished land office money to the settlers 
in exchange for other money not receivable at the land of- 
fice without any cost to the settlers. 

At the same time the receiver at the land office kept his 
money on deposit with the bank. The Madison Bank dis- 
charged all its obligations punctually, but when Langdon 
Cheeves became president of the Second United States Bank 
he refused to have any dealings with local banks in Tennes- 
see, Indiana or Illinois. A reason for this action may be 
that the States named had refused to allow branches of the 
United States Bank established in them. The order of Mr. 
Cheeves broke practically every bank in the States named. 
The Farmers and Mechanics' paid all its obligations, grad- 
ually retired all its currency, and was honorably closed by 
John Lanier and Milton Stapp. 

The Vincennes Bank was not so successful. Its charter 
was confirmed by the State constitution and it was adopted 
as a State Bank with branches. The intention of the in- 
corporators was to acquire a complete monopoly of the 
banking business of the State. A glance at the location of 
the branches will show that the business was well planned. 

The first branch was to be organized at Centerville ; the 
second at Brookville ; the third at Lawrenceburg ; the fourth 
at Vevay ; the fifth at Madison ; the sixth at Jeff ersonville ; 
the seventh at Brownstown ; the eighth at Paoli ; the ninth 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 235 

at Salem; the tenth at Corydon; the eleventh at Troy; the 
twelfth at Darlington; the thirteenth at some point in 
Posey county ; the fourteenth at some point in Gibson coun- 
ty, and the parent bank was to be at Vincennes. 

Each branch was to serve three counties, and the stock 
was reserved for inhabitants of these counties except that 
the State reserved the right to subscribe for $375,000 
worth. This was too much. There were only about 75,000 
persons in the State. It would have required a subscription 
of about $30 per capita to organize the banks provided for 
by these laws. There was no money in the country and it 
was soon ascertained that all the branches could not be or- 
ganized. Three branches were finally opened — at Brook- 
ville, Vevay and Corydon. 

These banks might have served a useful purpose, but 
before they got fairly on their feet they were caught in the 
hard times of 1818 and 1819 and ruined. The parent bank 
had backed a large industrial company at Vincennes. When 
this establishment was destroyed by fire, the bank lost 
$91,000. A large part of the business of the bank was to 
furnish money for the buyers of public lands. Under the 
ruling of Cheeves the bank notes were no longer receivable 
at the land office. The bank failed with $168,453 of United 
States money on deposit. This was later made good by the 
stockholders. 

By a law the State taxes were receivable in the notes 
of the bank. The State had borrowed $20,000 from the 
bank for which the bank held State bonds. These bonds 
had been turned over to the United States treasury as part 
payment on that debt. The State treasurer, Lane, at the 
direction of Governor Jennings, took $20,000 of the bank's 
own notes and proceeded over to Vincennes to redeem the 
State bonds. The cashier refused to receive the notes, but 
did not tell Mr. Lane that the Secretary of the Treasury of 
the United States held the State bonds. This fact, how- 
ever, was soon learned, and a spirited correspondence be- 
tween the governor and the secretary resulted. The mat- 



236 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ter was amicably settled by Senator James Noble, who took 
the matter in charge. i' 

The story of the Ohio Falls Canal takes us back into the 
territorial days of Indiana J "^ The portage at Louisville had 
been a bugbear to navigation since the first settlements 
along the upper Oiiio. The greatest demand for a canal 
came from Cincinnati, and the legislature of Ohio manifest- 
ed more concern in its building than that of either Indiana 
or Kentucky. The earliest attempt by Indiana people was 
about 1805, when a company, composed largely of Clark 
county citizens, subscribed $120,000. Rivermen seemed 
willing to pay a large toll rather than unload their boats or 
risk running the falls. 

One of the first acts signed by Jonathan Jennings, the 
first governor of Indiana, was an act to incorporate "The 
Ohio Canal Company." The incorporation name was John 
Bigelow & Company, capital stock 20,000 shares of $50 
each, or a total of $1,000,000. Much of the capital was ex- 
pected from Madison and Cincinnati. The directors in- 
cluded some of the most prominent early settlers of Clark 
county. The long law of twenty-three sections shows much 
careful thought and argues that its framers expected soon 
to see the work done. The power of eminent domain was 
conferred, both for right of way and for building material. 
The company might double its capital if necessary. Its 
books were to be opened to the inspection of the General 
Assembly or of its agents. The canal was to become the 
property of the State in 1858. No tax was required of the 
corporation until its canal was complete. The canal was 
to be cut on the Indiana side. The act is an evidence of the 
aspirations of the two young Hoosier cities. 

The charter of 1816, how^ever, not being liberal enough 
in its provisions to suit foreigners, the money for the canal 
was not forthcoming. Governor Jennings, in his message 
December 2, 1818, recommended that something be done to 

I'Lognu Esarey, State B<uikiii<i hi Far] if liiditnui: also Waldo ^lit- 
oliell, Growth of ludinna. 1812-1820. in /ntliinni ]ltifi(i.:iiir of History, 
December, 1914. 

18 History of Ohio Falls Citirs. I. 53. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 237 

secure the canal at New Albany. i'" Accordingly a second 
company was chartered, January 18, 1818, and the old 
charter canceled. The main provisions of the old charter 
were retained.-" The directors were given power to fix the 
tolls without legal restraint. They were further empow- 
ered to receive subscriptions from any source, especially 
the United States government. They were given the privi- 
lege of raising $100,000 by lottery; one-half the amount to 
be invested in stock for the State, the other half in stock 
for the company. Work was to begin in two years, and be 
completed in 1824. The charter was to expire by limitation 
in 1899. Work began in 1819. The course, two and one- 
half miles long, was laid down from the ravine at the mouth 
of Cone creek to the eddy at the foot of the rapids. Bige- 
low and Beach, the local bankers, were the chief promoters. 
They were using Cincinnati capital. Cone creek was 
dammed and a new channel cut for it along the canal route. 
Clark county clay was found rather too stubborn and the 
plan failed. 

In their zeal the projectors overlooked two very impor- 
tant considerations — neither the labor nor the capital could 
be had in the vicinity at the time, and the amount of com- 
merce was not sufficient to attract outside capital. There 
was a further reason. The legislature of Kentucky in 
1825 chartered a company, backed by Philadelphia capital, 
to build a canal on the Kentucky side.'-^ The United States 
subscribed $290,200 to the enterprise. The contract called 
for completion October, 1827, but it was not entirely com- 
pleted till 1831. 

§ 45 Moving the Capital to Indianapolis 

In the enabling act the national government gave the 
new State four sections of land as a site for a permanent 
capital. The site could not be located so long as the whole 

^^ House Journal, 1817, 8. 

-(> Laws of Indiana, 1817. 

21 Western, Sun, Janu.iry 14, 1827. For a complete account of the 
canal see Logan Esarey, Internal Improvements in Early Indiana, 65 
seq. 



238 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

central part of the State was claimed by Indians. A treaty 
was accordingly made with the Indians in 1818, by which 
the heart of the State was opened up for settlement. 

Governor Jennings in his message of 1819, called the 
attention of the General Assembly to "The New Purchase," 
and advised that body that it was time to appoint a com- 
mission to select a site for a State capital. The House of 
Representatives at once took up the matter. By an act 
signed January 11, 1820, a commission of ten men was 
chosen. -- 

March 22, Governor Jennings summoned these commis- 
sioners to meet at the house of William Connor on the west 
fork of White river. The time set for the meeting was 
Monday, May 22. The commissioners met according to 
notice and spent the time till June 7 examining White river 
and the adjacent country. On the latter date they met at 
the mouth of Fall creek and decided on the location of the 
capital. All the members signed this petition except Wil- 
liam Prince. 

The report was duly received by Governor Jennings, 
who transmitted it to the General Assembly. The legisla- 
ture ratified the selection, and on the same day — January 6 
— appointed another commission to lay off the town. The 
latter commission consisted of Christopher Harrison, James 
Jones, and Samuel Booker. The first-named was the only 
active member. 

Alexander Ralston and Elias Fordham did the survey- 
ing. The town was soon laid off with the "circle" as the 
center. The wide streets and radiating avenues are due 
to the planning of these eastern men, who had seen a plat 
of the national capital. Gen. John Carr was agent for the 
new town and conducted the first land sale, beginning Oc- 
tober 28, 1821, and lasting one week. About 300 lots were 
sold for about $35,000. 

22 These men were George Hunt of WajTie county, John Connor of 
Fayette, Stephen Ludlow of Dearborn, .John Gilliland of Switzerhind. 
Joseph Bartholomew of Clark, John Tipton of Harrison. Jesse B. Dur- 
ham of Jaclvson. Fred Rapp of Posey, William Prince of Gibson, and 
Thomas Emison of Knox. Their official report is in the office of the 
secretary of state at Indianapolis. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 239 

The same act that appointed the commission to lay off 
the town also provided a name for it. Nothing came up 
during that session of the General Assembly that provoked 
such acrimonious debate and such merriment as naming 
the new capital. A strong effort was made to name the 
new town Tecumseh. Some of the old Indian fighters, as 
Marston Clark of Salem, urged that name. The name "In- 
dianapolis" is said to have been suggested by Jeremiah Sul- 
livan of Madison, and accepted as a compromise. 

§ 46 Settlement of the New Purchase 

The period from 1816 to 1825 was one of unprecedented 
immigration to Indiana. The settlers crowded up the 
south-flowing streams beyond the center of the State. At 
the close of the period the number of counties had increased 
to fifty-two.-^ Almost all the territory south of the Wa- 
bash had been organized and the line of settlement was well 
to the north of the present line of the National Road. The 
latter had not yet been opened and practically all the set- 
tlers came by way of, or across the Ohio river. 

James W. Jones, Robert M. Evans, and Hugh McGary 
advertised a sale of lots for Evansville, June 20 and 21, 
1817.-^ They claimed for it the best location on the north 
bank of the Ohio. Good mill-sites on Pigeon creek could 
be had, and the surrounding country was producing heavy 
crops of corn, wheat, hemp, and tobacco. 

A week previous, John Allen had advertised a sale of 
lots for Washington, the county seat of the new county of 
Daviess. The agent pointed out the advantage of its loca- 
tion at the forks of White river on the main State road 
from Vincennes to the Falls. It adjoined Liverpool, a vil- 
lage that had been settled seven years, having been used 
as a fort in the last war, and had 300 population. The sale 
of lots was to commence June 9.-^ 

During this same time, 1817, the pioneers had pushed 
on up the Wabash and founded the town of Terre Haute. 

23 B. V. Shockley, iu Indiana Magazine of History, March, 1914. 
24: Western Sun, April 19, 1817. 
25 Western Sun, April 12, 1817. 



240 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The soldiers from Fort Harrison had praised the country 
highly. Lots to the value of $21,000 were sold in one day.-^ 

During the next year, 1818, Joseph Taylor, Truman 
Blackman, and William Harris opened up a settlement ten 
miles above Fort Harrison. In the fall, September 1, they 
advertised a sale of lots in the town of Clinton.-' 

It was customary for these founders of cities to offer a 
public square free, and they usually stated that a lot would 
be given free to the first physician and to each of the first 
three or five carpenters who would put up houses. 

The proximity of the Indians now retarded the advance 
somewhat, but by 1824 a great many settlers had pushed 
beyond Clinton. On Monday, June 7, John Collett opened 
a sale of lots for the town of Newport, situated two miles 
from the Wabash and on the south side of the Little Ver- 
million. 

During these latter years many settlers had penetrated 
the upland vales of what is now Parke county. Rockville 
was selected as the county seat of the new county of Parke, 
and here Thomas Smith, the county agent, opened a sale 
of lots June 16, 1824.2s 

The picturesque hills and chasms of Pine creek had for 
many years been a favorite haunt of the Kickapoo Indians. 
Traders had resided in the vicinity for an unknown period. 
Among the first permanent settlers who located in the neigh- 
borhood were Daniel Stump and George Hollingsworth, who 
advertised a sale of lots for the newly-laid town of Attica 
just across the Wabash from the mouth of Pine creek, May 
30, 1825. It is significant of the newness of the settle- 
ments in this region that the nearest grist mill, until in 
1824, was at Terre Haute.-'^ 

During the period 1816-1825 many new towns were laid 
out on the Ohio. These were shipping ports for the set- 
tlers many miles in the interior. Goods were hauled in 
many cases to and from Madison, New Albany, Leaven- 

'■^(^ Nile's Register. April 5. 1S17 ; Western Sun. May 0, 1818. 

27 Western Sun, May 16. 1818. 

28 Western Sun, May 22, 1824. 

^^ Richmond Ledger, April 30, 1825. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 241 




Tin: IrsUiANs — Fkom Stati: Gkoi.octcal Rki-okt, 18S2. 



242 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

worth, Troy, Rockport, and Evansville, a distance of fifty 
miles. It is noticeable that all the young towns last-named 
were on deep north bends of the river. Sprinkiesburg Au- 
gust 6, Fredonia May 30, and Rockport June 30, were laid 
out on the river, in 1818, while farther back in Dubois 
county John Niblack had laid out a county seat called Por- 
tersville, on Driftwood, July 20.''*" 

Meanwhile the hillside glades and shady vales of Wash- 
ington, Orange, Lawrence, and Monroe counties were at- 
tracting an ever increasing stream of settlers from the 
South by way of the Falls at Louisville. The heavy oak 
and beech furnished ample mast to fatten thousands of 
swine, while cattle and even horses lived almost through 
the winter on the wild pea vines of the glades. Here, also, 
it was claimed, they were safe from the ague and malaria 
that infested the level lands. 

As soon as the War of 1812 was over the settlers be- 
gan to spread from their fortified home at Vallonia. Salem 
was laid out by Silas Wright in the spring of 1814, Orleans 
in the spring of 1816, Paoli by Jonathan Lindley in 1816, 
Palestine, first capital of Lawrence county, by Robert M. 
Carlton, in 1818,''i receiving $14,165 for 157 lots, at the 
same time letting a contract for the building of a "superb 
brick court house." Benjamin Parke, the county agent, 
sold the first lots of Bloomington, May 5, 1818."^- He added 
in his advertisement that Salt creek was navigable, that 
the town would be the county seat of Monroe county, the 
seat of the State University, and most likely the capital 
of the State. 

These pioneers from the South pushed on to White river 
at Spencer and Gosport the next year. By 1820 the squat- 
ters had reached Greencastie, and by 1824 they had pene- 
trated the "Big Flat Woods" as far as Crawfordsville, 
where General Ambrose Whitlock and Williamson Dunn 

30 These are all taken from arlvertisements in tlie Wrsfeiii Sun. Cf. 
Waldo Mitchell, ''Growth of IndUiun. 1.S12-1S20." in Indiana Magazine 
of History, December. 191-1. 

31 ^kladison Indiana Republican. October 17, 1S18. 

32 Western Sun, May 16, 1818. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 243 

had laid off the town of Crawfordsville on the bluffs of 
Sugar creek. 

Another branch of this stream of immigrants followed 
Driftwood from Vallonia and Brownstown, founding the 
Haw Patch, Jonesville, and Flat Rock settlements in Bar- 
tholomev/ county before 1820. Lots were sold in Columbus 
early in 1821. 

The settlements were reinforced by many pioneers 
vv^ho came across from the Whitewater country, following 
Whetzeli's Trace to Johnson county or coming from the Falls 
by the old Indian Trail. This latter divided at Driftwood, 
one route leading to the mouth of the Kentucky, the other 
to the Falls of the Ohio. Along these trails came Jacob 
Whetzell and John Vawter, the earliest settlers of Johnson 
county, the former from Franklin county and the latter 
from Madison. The pioneers of Marion, Johnson, and 
Bartholomew reached the Ohio river by three routes. Those 
from the Whitewater traded to Cincinnati, those from Jef- 
ferson county to Madison or New Albany, and those from 
the lower settlements to Maukport by way of Brownstovv^n, 
Salem, and Cory don. Ox teams were in general use for 
these long trips. •"^•'^ 

The settlements on the Whitewater were keeping pace 
with those farther to the west. Wayne was the most popu- 
lous county of the State. The first sale of lots in Richmond 
took place in August, 1816.^-1 By 1822 it had 410 inhabit- 
ants with factories, stores, and two newspaper presses. It 
was the seat of the annual meeting of the Quakers, who 
had built a house for that purpose one hundred feet long by 
sixty feet wide and two stories high.^^ 

33 D. D. Baiit:i, A Historical ^keirh of Johnson County. 

34 Sile's Register, February 9, 1S22. and April .3, 1S24. 

35 Richmond Inteiliyencer, Auff. 2S, 1822. 
Western Sun, April 21, 1821. 

"Through the politeness of Colonel .John Vawtei', marshal for the 
State of Indiana, we have been favored with following census:" 

Clark 3709 Fayette 5950 

Crawford 2583 Floyd 2776 

Daviess 2432 Franklin 10763 

Dearborn 11468 Gibson 3876 

Delaware 3677 Harrison 7875 



244 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The sale of county lots at New Castle, seat of Henry 
county, took place August 5, 1822. Trading posts and 
squatters were stationed all along the upper course of 
White river as far as Muncietown, 

As noted in a previous chapter, Indianapolis was se- 
lected by the General Assembly to become the State capital. 
Gen. John Carr, the State Agent, opened the first sale of 
lots from the "Donation" October 8, 1821. There was at 
that time a considerable village with three taverns. Squat- 
ters had located in the neighborhood as early as 1820. 
The spring of 1820 saw a rush of settlers to the place.^" 

The Richmond Ledger, October 22, 1825, said the tide 
of immigration had never before set so hard toward Indi- 
ana. For days the main street (National Road) had been 
thronged with persons moving west, principally from Ohio. 
They appeared to be of the thrifty, well-to-do class, driv- 
ing large flocks of sheep and horned cattle. The Bloom- 
ington Gazette, October 8, 1825, stated that there was 
scarcely a day but throngs of movers passed through town 
on their way to White river and the Wabash. The Indiana 
Journal, at Indianapolis, October 11, said there had passed 
that town daily for the last four or five weeks, twenty to 
thirty families, coming from Ohio and going to the Wa- 

J.ickson JOIO Scott 2:«4 

Jefferson N03.S Spcnoer 1882 

Jeuuiugs 2000 Snlliv.-ni 3498 

Kuox 5437 Switzerland 3034 

Lawrence 4416 Vaiiderlnirir 1398 

Martin 1032 \v,n^ 3390 

Monroe 2679 Wabash 147 

Owen 838 Wa.nick 1749 

Orange 5368 Washington 2039 

Perry 2330 Wryne 12119 

Pike 1472 No i-eturns from Dnbois 

Posey 4061 Estimated 1500 

]tandoli)h 1808 

Kijiley 1812 Total 147,600 

3« J. H. B. Nowland, Early Reminiscences of Indianapolis; Berry R. 
Sulgrove, History of Indianapolis and Marion County; Nile's Register, 
XXII. 48; Weslern Sun, Nov. 8, 1823. gives a notice of the remarkable 
growth of the town; see also issue of Nov. 3, 1821. A series of articles 
in the Indiana Journal, Nov. 4, 1846, to Mar. 22. 1847. by a pioneer gives 
an excellent acconnt of the founding of the capital. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 245 

bash. All seemed in good circumstances. Similar reports 
came from many other towns in the State. 

The entries of land at the land office witness the rush 
of immigrants. In 1816 a land sale opened at Vincennes 
and in three weeks about 1,500 tracts had been sold for 
over half a million dollars. Vincennes and Jeff ersonvi lie 
were the leading land offices in the United States in the 
amount of business. By 1821 this activity had shifted to 
Brookville, as a result of the opening of the "New Pur- 
chase." The latter office, for 1821, took the lead, selling 
in that year over $200,000 worth of land.-^" By the close 
of the period the omce at Crawfordsville was handling the 
rush and setting a record for the United States in the sale 
of lands. ^•'^ 

Various means of transportation and travel were in use. 
A great many of the poorer class, including a large propor- 
tion of the young men, traveled on foot. The movers usu- 
ally had wagons drawn by horses or more often by oxen. 
Accompanying each wagon or train of wagons, for they 
often "moved" in companies, were droves of cattle, sheep, 
and hogs attended by the younger men and boys. A trav- 
eler on the traces met "movers" going and coming. Hun- 
dreds came to the frontiers, lured by the glowing adver- 
tisements, only to be scared out on arrival by the sickness 
prevailing ev^ery where, and by the amount of hard work 
and harder living everywhere necessary. Thus discour- 
aged, they soon retraced their journey, A tavern keeper 
on the New Albany- Vincennes road stated that upwards 
of 5,000 souls had passed his tavern on the way to Missouri 
during the year 1819. •'5" Many of these returned imme- 
diately. 

37 This office was located part of the time at Indiaiiaiiolis. 

38 For the land office reports see American State Papers. Finance V, 
index. 

The following table shows lands sold in State. 1820-1825. 

Acres. Acres. 

1820 162.490 1828 165,046 

1821 264.578 1824 154,.558 

1822 252.<.I82 1825 162.270 

3E> w. Faux. Journal of u Tour to the United States, (1823). 212. 

(17) 



1/ 



246 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

As early as the spring of 1820 a Mr. Foyies projected 
a stage line from Vincennes to Louisville, making the trip 
between 6 a. m. Wednesday and 1 p. m. Friday. This was 
said to be the first stage in Indiana.^" A post stage carry- 
ing United States mail was established between Louisville 
and Vincennes April 10, 1824. It left the former place at 
noon Saturday and arrived, if on time, at Vincennes Tues- 
day, at 9 a. m., returning to Louisville by Thursday, 6 p. m. 
The distance was 107V2 miles and the fare $8.00. By May 
4, this had been extended on to St. Louis, and on July 14, a 
branch line started from Vincennes by way of Princeton 
to Evansville. It made the trip between 8 a. m. Wednes- 
day and 5 p. m. Thursday.^ ^ 

Other important traces led from Yellowbanks, north 
through Spencer county and Dubois, to Washington; from 
Troy to Paoli ; from Leavenorth to Paoli ; from Mauk's 
Ferry via Corydon, Salem, Vallonia, Columbus, and Frank- 
lin to Indianapolis ; from New Albany, via Salem, Orleans, 
Bedford, Bloomington, and Gosport to the Wabash or to 
Indianapolis ; from Madison to Columbus ; from Madison to 
Greensburg; and last and most used was the Cincinnati- 
Whitewater road to Indianapolis, In the later years of 
this period the National road began to be used. With the 
exception of the National road and the Vincennes road, the 
roads mentioned were mere unimproved traces through the 
forest, on which a stranger might count himself fortunate 
if he were not "lost" half the time. Ferries were uncom- 
mon and dangerous, fords at most seasons deep and muddy. 
Through the heavy timber these traces rarely dried out. 
In dodging the mudholes the drivers zigzagged hither and 
thither among the trees, making the location of the road all 
the more bewildering to the traveler.^ - 

Business during this period was usually active, due to 
the demands of the incoming settlers. A person coming 
up the river from New Orleans counted 643 loaded flat- 

•*<> Vincennes Centinel, April 15. 1820. 

41 Western Sun, Nov. 8. 1823; May 1. 1824; .July 10. 1824. 
^'-Indiana Oazetteer. 1849. 125, gives the experiences of Snniuel .Mer 
rill going from Corydon to Indianapolis in 1825. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 247 

boats on their way down.^^' The steamer "United States," 
launched at Jeffersonville May 15, 1819, was the largest on 
the western rivers. It was 166 feet long, 700 tons burden.^"* 
However, from 1819 to 1824, the export trade, as it was 
called, was dead. Grain rotted in the fields or in the stacks. 
There was no demand for it at New Orleans and there was 
no money to move it had there been a demand. Business 
men were unable even to pay the revenue on such goods as 
were taxed by the federal government. The General As- 
sembly petitioned Congress not to prosecute for such viola- 
tions.^"' There was due from land buyers at Jeffersonville 
January 1, 1819, $1,021,834; at Vincennes, $1,390,909.4« 
Congress from time to time passed laws in the hope of aid- 
ing public land debtors. The price of land was lowered 
from two dollars per acre to one and one-quarter. This 
immediately ruined all land values in the State, and made 
the hard times harder.^' Half the State taxes were de- 
linquent. 

The years 1820-1822 were pestilential throughout Indi- 
ana. Promising towns like Palestine and Hindostan were 
swept from the map. Vevay, Rising Sun, Jeffersonville, 
and Vincennes were almost deserted. Yellow fever from 
the south joined forces with ague, malaria, and milk-sick- 
ness to desolate the frontier.^^ 

43 mie's Register, .July 11, 1818. 

44 Vincennes Centinel, Mny 22. 1819. 

45 Annals IJj Congress, 1st Session, 31. 

46 Letters from Nathaniel Ewiug in American State Papers, Finance, 
III. 734. 

^"^ American State Papers, Finarwe, III, 782; Logan Esjire.v. State 
Banking in Indiana, 221. To add to the losses at AMncennes the large 
steam mill, the largest in the State, burned Feb. 10. 1821. "A few 
years past Vincennes was the very emblem of prosi)erity; every wind 
wafted her some good. Our houses were filled with inhabitants, our 
streets were crowded with citizens, the noisy hum of business resounded 
in our ears. All was life and activity. How sadly is the picture re- 
versed. More than one-third of our dwelling houses are destitute of 
inhabitants, our population has decreased nearly or quite one-half, our 
real property has suffered a greater diminution. Buildings, that a few 
years ago rented for $2fK) or $300 per annum now I'ent for $50 to $100. 
An universal despondency prevails.*' Western Sun, Feb. 16, 1822. 

'i^ Indiana Gazetteer, 18.50, 118-119; Indiana Magazine of History, X, 
No. 2, "HindoosUm." 



248 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

§ 47 Social and Political Organization 

Beside the ordinary American pioneers who flocked to 
Indiana there were a few representatives of the peculiar 
rehgious and economic ideas then prevalent in the East. 

During the summer of 1814 the Harmonie Community 
of Economy, Pennsylvania, sold out their interests in the 
old home and bought a large tract of land, 17,000 acres, in 
Posey county. Here they cleared fields, built capacious 
barns, established factories run by steam. By 1817 they 
had 200 acres of wheat, large vineyards, rye, barley, oats, 
and pasture fields, with 1,500 Merino sheep and other stock 
in proportion. In their factories were produced broad- 
cloth, tinware, shoes, saddles, flour, beer, and other com- 
modities. 

From their leader, Frederick Rappe, they were called 
Rappites. Their general customs were like those of the 
Shakers. All property was held in common. No bad com- 
pany was allowed; although they made beer, no one drank 
any of it. There were no marriages, and no children. For 
a few years it was the most noted place in the State. ^'^ 

Several communities more or less like the Harmonie 
located in different parts of the State. As noticed previ- 
ously, in Vevay a colony of Swiss from Canton Vaud, Swit- 
zerland, were cultivating the vine and prospering enough 
to attract the attention of the eastern newspapers. Their 
boats annually carried a valuable cargo to the New Orleans 
market. Besides wine they produced hay, and straw hats 
for the southern market."*^ 

Little was accomplished in the way of carrying out the 
plan of public education provided in the Constitution. The 
liberal grant of public land by the United States brought no 
present aid. There was so much cheap public land on the 
market that the school lands could neither be sold nor rented 
to advantage. A law of 1816 permitted twenty household- 
ers in a congressional township to organize and open a 

49 Western Sun, Feb. 13, 1819. Samuel Merrill. Indiana Gazetteer, 
1850. 3.34. Rapp sold to Robert Dale Owen in 1825: see also Geo. B. 
Lockwood. The l^ew Hai-mony Movement. 

50 isaie's Register, Aug. 23. and Nov. 29, 1817. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 249 

school. A law of 1824 incorporated the congressional town- 
ship and vested in its board title to the school lands. These 
trustees are the legal ancestors of our school directors, and 
this was the beginning of our district school system under 
the general supervision of the township trustee. Little was 
done on account of lack of revenues. 

At the same session, 1816, a law was passed by the Gen- 
eral Assembly providing for the organization of a seminary 
in each county. The instruction in these schools was sup- 
posed to be rather advanced and would prepare the stu- 
dents for the State Seminary which had been provided for 
by the law of 1820, and which was opened at Bloomington 
for students May 1, 1824. It required years of work on 
the part of the pioneers to find money, materials, and teach- 
ers to make this ambitious plan a living institution.-^^ 

Itinerant teachers opened private schools in many 
places. Mrs. Wood, in 1818, advertising a boarding school 
at Vincennes in which she taught se^ving, marking, and 
muslin work in addition to the common branches — an early 
instance of manual training. Jean Jean advertised for pu- 
pils in French and Latin. Horace Harding taught portrait 
painting. Bishop Flaget opened a girls' school in 1823. The 
old Vincennes Academy flourished also during this period. 

A State-wide medical society was organized in 1819. An 
organization of the churches had for its purpose the plac- 
ing of a Bible in every home in the State. Almost every 
new town that was laid out in the wilderness made provision 
for a public library. A reading room was provided at Vin- 
cennes in which several newspapers from the east and even 
from Europe could be found. One is surprised, not at the 
meager facilities for education, but at the universal interest 
in it and the many ways in which the interest vv^as shown. "'^ 

The politics of the young State centered around two 

51 La«-.s- of Indiana, 1816, 1S20, 1824; Baynard R. Hall. The Neiv 
Purchase: William A. Rawles, Centralizing Tendencies in the Adminis- 
tration of Indiana; Theojihilus A. Wylie, Indiana Uniiersity. Its His- 
tory; R.. G. Boone. History of Education in Indiana. 

52 For a good idea of this activity read the Western Sun. and the 
Centinel of Vincennes. and the Indiana Repul)}iean of Madison. Xo 
copies of the Corydon papers of this period are available. 



250 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

questions. The first in importance was the policy of the 
national government toward the public land. The great 
majority of the settlers bought their land on credit. With 
the failure of the markets during the hard times from 1818 
to 1823, many became embarrassed and not a few lost their 
partially paid-for land. In response to their petitions Con- 
gress first gave them extra time on their payments, then 
reduced the prices of land, and as a final measure allowed 
purchasers, unable to complete their payments, to forfeit 
their land and take a due-bill for money already paid, which 
could then be used in the purchase of land at any future 
time. 

The second political issue of importance to Indianians 
was internal improvements. The pioneers were very anx- 
ious to have the national government open up the streams 
and help build roads. William Hendricks, the first con- 
gressman of the State, was their champion in both these 
measures. He was without question the most popular man 
in the State, though Governor Jennings was the shrewdest 
politician. 

In 1817 the political opponents of Hendricks brought 
out Ex-Governor Posey as a candidate for Congress, but 
Hendricks was reelected to Congress by an overwhelming 
majority. In 1819 Lieutenant Governor Christopher Har- 
rison made the race against Jennings for the governorship, 
but was badly defeated.^s 

In 1822 William Hendricks succeeded Jennings as gov- 
ernor and Jennings became congressman in place of Hen- 
dricks. 

The first real political contest in the State took place 
in 1824 between the supporters of Clay, Adams, and Jack- 
son for the presidency.^4 For the first time there was 
county organization and platforms with handbills for the 
voters. 

In general the sympathies of the pioneers were for the 

53 Western Sun, Nov. 14. 1818; Def-. 26. 1818; July 24. 1819; Mn.v 1. 
1819; M.iy 22, 1819; Nile's Register, Sept. 25. 1819. 

54 The electors in 1816 niid in 1820 were appointed by the General 
Assembly. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 251 

rough and rugged Jackson. It was known that Jackson 
opposed the banks, and, on that ground, received the sup- 
port of great numbers of financially embarrassed settlers 
who attributed the scarcity of money to the manipulation 
of bankers. These men held a State convention at Salem, 
September 16, 1824, and nominated an electoral ticket and 
appointed a State committee to conduct the campaign.^^ 
The business men and the well-to-do farmers usually 
favored Clay on account of his position on the tariff and 
internal improvements. Indiana voters favored both these 
measures throughout the early period, 

Adams stood well with the lawyers and other profes- 
sional men and was the favorite among the Quakers and 
other settlers on the Whitewater. The result showed the 
great popularity of Jackson. He received 7,343 votes, Clay 
5,315, and Adams 3,093."'" Jackson received his highest 
vote in Washington county. Clay his highest in Jefferson, 
and Adams his in Wayne. The total vote was light, being 
only 15,751, out of a voting population of more than twice 
that number. 

The young State was receiving some attention, however, 
from the east and was not being slighted by politicians. 
In 1817 Henry Clay visited the State and was entertained 
by the city of Vincennes."'" In 1819 while President James 
Monroe was making a tour of the west he, in company with 
General Andrew Jackson, stopped at Jeffersonville and was 
escorted by the State militia out to Corydon, where a bar- 
becue was prepared. -^i^ But most sumptuous of all was the 
banquet tendered General Lafayette at Jeffersonville April 
16, 1825.^^' 

The opponents of slavery had had no difficulty in the 
constitutional convention in barring slavery from the State, 
but they could not so easily free the State from embarrass- 
ment on this subject. 

Trouble arose from three sources. A great many col- 

55 Western t^iin, Sept. 25, 1824. 

56 Western Sun, Dec. 4. 1824. 

57 Western Sun, June 7. 1817; Nile's Register, June 6. 1S17. 

58 Ccntinel. .Tuly 17. 1819 : Indiana EepuhJiean, July 3, 1810. 

59 Western Sun. Apr. 2P>: Apr. HO; M;\y 28; and July 2, 1825. 



252 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ored men, who had by various means secured their freedom 
in the South, came to Indiana to live. As a rule they be- 
came paupers and a charge on the county. So many cases 
of this kind had occurred that when W. E. Summers of 
Williamson county, Tennessee, asked permission of the 
First Assembly to buy homes and settle his forty freedmen 
in Indiana the question caused an animated contest. In a 
long letter John Dumont, chairman of the house committee, 
attempted to show Mr. Summers why colored persons were 
not wanted in the State. The house refused to send Mr. 
Dumont's letter and the General Assembly was unable to 
agree on any answer.*^" 

More aggravating than this question of colored paupers 
was the constant complaint made by Southern newspapers 
that fugitive slaves escaping into Indiana were aided in 
making their escape. In answer to these charges the First 
Assembly made anj^one aiding in this matter liable to a 
$500 claim for damage.'" In 1825 two citizens of Wayne 
county were so fined. 

Still worse was the custom of kidnapping free negroes 
and carrying them back to slavery, as practiced by unprin- 
cipled men along the border. July 4, 1818, three such men 
stole a negro girl from Corydon,*^- in 1821 a mob from 
Louisville attempted to kidnap a free colored man named 
Moses at New Albany. Nothing but the presence of the 
militia company saved the negro.''-^ September 21, 1822, 
James Burks tried to capture Edmund Robinson, a free col- 
ored man of Richmand. The latter escaped, but the attempt 
caused great excitement.^'^ 

The sentiment of the citizens of the State was not the 
same, however, in all parts of the State. Thus, while Noble 
and Hendricks were being severely denounced at a mass 
meeting at Montgomeryville for opposing the admission of 

60 Nile's Register, XI. 313; House Journal 1. 33, 43. A bill to admit 
three colored settlers was introduced but failed to pass. Senate Journal, 
1816, 7. 

61 Laws of Indiana, 1816. ch. XXIV. 

62 Nile's Register, XIV, 328. 

63 Vincennes Centincl, March 3, 1821. 

6-t Richmond Intelligencer, Sept. 25, 1822. 



THE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON 253 

Missouri as a slave State, the General Assembly, by a vote 
of 22 to 5, censured Taylor for voting for the Missouri 
Compromise and thus permitting slavery.'^^ 

The General Assembly further w^ent on record, Decem- 
ber 31, 1818, in a hot denunciation of the kidnapping of 
negroes on the border. The senators were instructed and 
the representatives requested to oppose in Congress all 
fugitive slave laws. 

6>> Nile's Register, XIX, 415. 



CHAPTER XI 

economic development from 1825-1835 

§ 48 Early Roads 

When Indiana was admitted into the Union it contained 
about 65,000 people. These lived chiefly in the Whitewater 
Valley, on the lower Wabash, and along the Ohio river hills. 
The problem of travel was a serious one and was not liable 
to be overlooked by legislators who had made the trip to 
Corydon or Indianapolis. 

There were well defined lines of travel leading into the 
interior of Indiana at this time, each in a measure used 
by a distinct stream of immigrants. From Kentucky, Vir- 
ginia, and the Carolinas, they came to Madison and Louis- 
ville. From Madison, a stage line was early established 
to the East Fork of White river, or Driftwood creek, cross- 
ing at the mouth of Flat Rock. From Louisville, Jefferson- 
ville, and New Albany two routes led to the interior ; one by 
Salem, Bono, Bedford, and Bloomington to the Wabash at 
Lafayette; the other led by Greenville, Fredericksburg, 
Paoli, Mt. Pleasant, and Maysville to the Wabash at Vin- 
cennes. 

One can scarcely realize the condition of travel in 1825. 
There was no railroad, no canal, no pike. All the rivers 
except the Ohio were obstructed by fallen trees, ripples, 
and bars. Two main roads led to Indianapolis, one from 
Madison, the other from Centerville. The transportation 
service, if any was to be had, v/as bad, roads frequently im- 
passable and stages usually late. 

Two schemes for carrying on internal traffic were early 
taken up by the Indiana government. The earliest was the 
building of State roads with the three per cent fund. Con- 
gress had set aside five per cent of the net proceeds of all 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 255 

the land sold in Indiana for road building. Three per cent 
of this was placed at the disposal of the General Assembly, 
and was always known as the three per cent fund. In 1818 
Christopher Harrison was appointed the first agent of this 
fund. He received the money from the United States and 
paid it out, according to appropriation by the General As- 
sembly, to the county agent. The county agent used it in 
opening roads through the forest. Such roads, known as 
State roads, were one hundred feet wide, but the money 
was not sufficient to do more than clear them of timber. 
Until the country was settled more thickly, and there were 
consequently more "hands" to work the roads, these were 
little more than bridle paths. Yet much of the time of the 
General Assembly from 1818 to 1840 was occupied in au- 
thorizing these roads and distributing the three per cent 
fund. In 1821, $10,000 was appropriated. The fund was 
usually overdrawn; nevertheless it was a great aid to the 
pioneers, most of whom earned money, working on the 
roads at $1.50 per day, to pay their annual taxes. All told, 
over one-half a million dollars were received by the State 
for this purpose. Various fanciful schemes were discussed 
in the legislature from time to time for disposing of the 
fund, but on the whole it was loyally used. 

As early as 1802 the subject of a National Road had oc- 
cupied the attention of Congress, and in the bill admitting 
Ohio five per cent of the proceeds of the public land sales 
in that State was set aside as a fund for building roads 
by which emigrants might reach the public lands of the 
west. Four years later, a bill passed Congress for a survey 
of a road from Cumberland, Maryland, to the Ohio river. 
The route followed the old Braddock trail nearly to the 
Battleground, and then turned to the west, striking the 
Ohio at Wheeling. 1 

It is not usually realized by Americans that this is the 
greatest wagon road in the world. It was surveyed eighty 
feet in width, the timber was then grubbed, and the ground 
graded. Culverts and bridges were built of cut stone, and 

1 Sehaff, Historii of Eimi and KirkrrsriJIc. 61 •syy/,- TikJUiiui Magazine 
of History, III. 58 xff/. 



256 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

at last a track in the center, thirty to forty feet wide, was 
macadamized with ten inches of stone. Two six-horse 
teams could race abreast on this road. In 1818 the road 
reached to Wheeling, in 1833 to Columbus, Ohio, and in 
1852 to Vandalia, Illinois. 

From six to twelve independent stage lines operated on 
it, and a score of companies were in the transportation busi- 
ness. The schedule of the mail stage was thirty hours from 
Washington to Wheeling, forty-five hours to Columbus, 
sixty hours to Indianapolis, and seventy-five hours to Van- 
dalia. Only thoroughbred Virginia horses were used on the 
best lines, and the sound of the bugle was as certain an 
indication of the time of day as the passing of passenger 
trains on railroads today. The coachman was a man of con- 
sequence along the route, and almost an idol for the boys. 
To see him dash up to a post, throw the lines to the stable 
boys, tell the latest news from the east while the teams 
were changing, then break away at a fifteen-mile clip, was 
enough to attract all the youngsters for a mile or two. The 
driver usually courted this admiration, and never missed a 
chance to take a boy on the seat with him — a favor the boy 
paid for with apples and cider, and remembered with pride 
during the rest of his life. A guild of wagoners soon grew 
up in the freight business, who were well known and thor- 
oughly reliable. 

The road was surveyed in Indiana by Jonathan Knight, 
a government surveyor. He reached Indianapolis July 8, 
1827, finishing it by September 4, of the same year, to the 
western boundary of the State.- The road in Indiana is 
almost straight, crossing the State with a loss of only two 
miles from a straight line. The distance from the eastern 
State line to Indianapolis is seventy-one miles; from In- 
dianapolis to Farrington's ferry at Terre Haute, where it 
crossed the Wabash, is seventy and one-fourth miles. 

The national government was slow in completing the 
road in Indiana. In 1830, $60,000 were appropriated. This 
was used in building the sixteen miles east and twelve miles 
west of the capital. The old covered bridge on Washing- 

^ Indiana Journal. .July 10. niul Sept. 4. l.'^27. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 257 

ton street, Indianapolis, where the road crossed White river, 
was built in 1834. The macadamized road became Wash- 
ington street and was the first improved street in the capi- 
tal. Congress finally abandoned it in Indiana in 1839. It 
then became the property of the State, which leased it to 
the "Plank Road Company." This company covered a great 
part of the road west of Indianapolis with heavy, narrow, 
oak planks, which made an excellent road for a few years. 
When the planks wore out the company abandoned it and 
it became a public county road. It was then graveled and 
still remains one of the best roads in the State.^ 

Thirty-four different acts of Congress show how im- 
portant the road was in a national way. It cost $6,824,919, 
but it was never completed. It was surveyed and opened 
to Vandalia and St. Louis, but was never macadamized be- 
yond Indiana. Congress did not overestimate its value. It 
was a powerful agent for the Union, and a material symbol 
of its power and usefulness. 

It bound the East and the West together and brought 
them three days' travel nearer each other. During the 
twenty years of its greatness a steady stream of ''movers," 
with their covered wagons and droves of cattle, hogs, and 
sheep, poured into Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. For months 
at a time there was no moment in the daytime that a family 
wagon was not in sight. At night the road appeared like 
the picket line of an army. Having traveled over this road, 
the memory of it lingered long and came back especially 
vivid as one traveled over the corduroy or mud roads of 
early Indiana. Most of the settlers of the central and east- 
ern part of the State were familiar with "the old pike." 

§ 49 The Michigan Road 

Article two of the treaty between the Pottawattomie 
Indians and United States commissioners, made October IG, 
1826, ceded to the State of Indiana what was considered a 
sufficient amount of land to build a public highway from 
Lake Michigan to the Ohio. This road was to be one hun- 

3 Berry R. Sulgrove, History of liidianapolis, 107. 



258 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

dred feet wide, and to this right of way the Indians added 
a further gift of a section of contiguous land for every mile. 
Where the contiguous land did not belong to the Indians — 
all south of the Wabash — Indiana was to select a section 
of unsold Indian land for every mile of road. The United 
States confirmed the treaty February 7, 1827, and con- 
firmed to the State the gift made bj' the Indians by act of 
March 2, 1827.^ 

In 1828 John I. Neely, Chester Elliott, and John Mc- 
Donald were appointed commissioners to lay down the road 
from Lake Michigan to Indianapolis."' They were instructed 
to select the best natural harbor on the lake ; or, in the ab- 
sence of a good one, the best place to construct an artificial 
one. The route from Logansport to the lake offered con- 
siderable difficulty. The terms of the grant were for a di- 
rect road which would necessarily lead through the Kan- 
kakee swamps, where nobody lived, and where it would be 
very costly to build a road. To avoid this, the road would 
have to run due north from Logansport to the South Bend 
of the St. Joseph, thence west to Lake Michigan. The point 
where Michigan City now stands — the mouth of Trail creek 
— was selected for the northern terminus. Then two com- 
plete sets of field notes and plats were made, one for a road 
by South Bend, the other direct through the Kankakee flats. 

The choice of routes was thrown back on the General 
Assembly and caused much angry discussion.^ The com- 
missioners, it was asserted, had been unduly influenced by 
the citizens of South Bend. January 13, 1830, the route of 
the second survey by the way of South Bend was chosen." 
The act of January 29, 1830, established the road from 
Logansport via Indianapolis and Greensburg to Madison.^ 

4 For the best discussion of the Miehigran road see a decision by 
.Tudge Black, of Bloomington. Indiana, in the case of the Western Union 
Telegraph Company vs. Krueger, 74 Northeastern. 453. The historical 
part was written by Charles Moores, of Indianapolis, one of the attor- 
neys in the case. Also Senate Doc. XXXV, 453: Indiana Magazine of 
History, III. SO. 

5 Laws of Indiana, 1827, ch. 70. 

6 Laws of Indiana, 1830, ch. 148 — Joint Resolution. 

7 Laws of Indiana, 1829, ch. 69, sec. 1. 

8 Laws of Indiana, ch. 70. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 259 

A new board, consisting of Samuel Hanna of Wayne county, 
William Polke of Knox, and Abraham McClellan of Sulli- 
van county, was named. This board served only one year 
and was abolished by act of January 4, 1831. From this 
time on the whole work was entrusted to William Polke. 
The road was expected to be cleared and grubbed from 
Madison to the Wabash by November 30, 1831. 

Three surveying parties, headed by Commissioners 
Hanna, McClellan, and Polke, spent the summer of 1830 
selecting and surveying Indian lands.-' They had not made 
their final report until they were notified that Congress had 
refused to ratify their choice and had demanded that the 
road be laid down and then "contiguous" sections be 
chosen. 1" Further, the sections must be selected from land 
not yet ceded by the Indians. The construction of the road 
went steadily on, however, scrip being used instead of 
money. This scrip was based on ceded lands and almost 
the whole road was financed with it. Noah Noble, who had 
the southern end in charge, laid off the road in sections of 
four miles each. By act of February 4, 1831, Polke opened 
the sale of land at Logansport. No land was to be sold un- 
der $1.25 per acre. The part of the road from Logansport 
to St. Joseph county was ordered under contract at a price 
not exceeding $150 per mile. The road was divided into 
three sections. ^^ The first, from Madison to Indianapolis, 
was under the immediate supervision of Daniel Kelso ; the 
second reached to Logansport and was under Horace Bas- 
sett ; the last was under Polke himself. Contracts for build- 
ing the road were let during the year 1832. Beginning at 
Madison, the road was laid oflF into sections of from ten to 
twenty miles each and the grading let to the lowest bidder. 
Bridges were let under separate contracts. The whole road, 
265 miles long, was put under contract by June 30. During 
1832 lands were placed on sale at Laporte.^^ Scrip was ac- 
cepted in payment for all lands. The road was cleared one 

» Western Sun, Oct. 30. 1830. 

10 Western Sun, .Tan. 15, 1831. 

11 House Journal, 1834, 106. 

12 House Journal, 1833, Appendix. 



260 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

hundred feet wide, thirty feet of which was grubbed and 
graded. By 1836 it was clearly ascertained that this made 
a poor road. In the worst stretches logs were laid cross- 
wise and covered with sand. Many bridges were washed 
away every year by the streams. Although the road was 
used enormously north of Indianapolis, it was anything but 
satisfactory. It passed through fourteen counties, and was 
used by the inhabitants of thirty-five in going to the capital. 
The General Assembly at almost every session had to make 
an appropriation for repairs. 

By 1837 the State was not able to give further aid to it, 
the State's resources being completely prostrated. By act 
of February 2, 1837, the various county boards, through 
whose jurisdiction the road ran, were required to divide it 
into suitable sections, over each of which a supervisor was 
to be placed with power to call out the hands to keep it in 
repair. ^2 The hands were liable to two days' work a year. 
By act of February 13, 1841, and January 31, 1842, the 
road was classed with all other State roads and brought 
entirely within the compass of the general road law of 1838. 

The Michigan road began at Madison, ran almost due 
north through Jefferson and Ripley counties to Greensburg 
in Decatur. Thence by a direct line, it led across Shelby 
county to the capital. The important sections of the road 
were those from Indianapolis across Hamilton, Boone, Clin- 
ton, and Carroll counties to Logansport, and from that place 
due north again across Cass, Fulton, and Marshall, to South 
Bend, and thence west to Michigan City. During eight 
months of the year it was an open passable highway, but 
during the winter it was an endless stream of black mud 
and almost useless. Its importance may be estimated from 
the fact that one-half the pioneers of the northwest quarter 
of Indiana reached their homes over it. As a road it was 
not comparable to the National, but it was an available 
means of reaching a very attractive country when there was 
none other. 

13 Laics of Indkina. ISoG. ch. 49. sec. 3. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 261 

§ 50 Stage Lines 

The stage coach followed close on the trail of the pio- 
neers. Early in the spring of 1820 a Mr. Foyles started a 
stage line from Louisville to Vincennes. The advertise- 
ment stated that it was the first line to be established in 
the State. This is perhaps true. The trace from Louisville 
to Vincennes is the oldest in the State. At first it ran along 
the boundary between Crawford and Orange counties fol- 
lowing the south bank of Driftwood and crossing White 
river north of Petersburg. But the settlement of the towns 
of Washington, Mt. Pleasant, Hindostan, and Paoli caused 
most travelers to go by the northern route. It was over 
these routes that Fo^^les established his stage line, using 
whichever road seemed best. 

This line continued in operation till it was superseded 
by the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad just before the Civil 
War.i^ The General Assembly petitioned Congress in 1829 
for a grant of land to aid in building a clay turnpike over 
this route, but no aid was received. i'' 

One among the first advertisements of a regular stage 
line to Indianapolis appears to have been that of John Wil- 
son. This line from Madison began during the summer 
of 1828. The stage left Indianapolis at 7 a. m. Thursday, 
reached Columbus via Franklin at 5 p. m. Friday, left there 
at 7 a. m. Saturday and arrived at Madison via Vernon at 
5 p. m. Sunday. The fare was six and one-quarter cents 
per mile with fifteen pounds of baggage free. 

In 1830 James Johnson started a line from Lawrence- 
burg, making the distance in two days and one night. The 
next year, 1831, A. L. and W. L. Ross put stages on the 
Brookville road. These connected at Brookville with A. 
McCarty's line for Cincinnati, and at Rushville with the 
Ohio stage. The Brookville stage made the trip in two 
days, or three days to Cincinnati. In June, 1832, P. Beers 
advertised that his stage would make the trip from In- 

14 At present a stage runs from Paoli to New All)any over this same 
road, now a macadamized turnpike. This is tlie oldest jiike in the 8tate 
and also the oldest stage line. 

1^ //((?/««« Journal, Dec. 24. 1829. 

(18) 



262 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

dianapolis to Dayton, Ohio, in two and one-half days, or, 
connecting- at Eaton, the passenger could reach Cincinnati 
in two and one-half days. The following summer, April 
26, James Johnson and Company put on a through line of 
stages between Cincinnati and Indianapolis via Lawrence- 
burg, Napoleon, Greensburg, and Shelbyville. The John- 
son coaches made the trip in two days and nights, the fare 
being $5.50 one way. 

Not to be outdone in this race, James H. Wallace and 
Company, the next spring, put coaches on the Madison line 
which made the trip in one day, leaving Indianapolis Mon- 
days, Wednesdays and Fridays at 3 a. m. and reaching 
Madison at 8 p. m. in time to catch the Cincinnati packet, 
which would land them early next morning at Cincinnati, 
after a night's sleep and a good breakfast. Hacks were 
kept at each end of the route for the convenience of those 
who did not want to travel so swiftly. In 1835 Seth M. 
Leavenworth, founder of the town by that name in Craw- 
ford county, in partnership with John Orchard and Jona- 
than Williams, started a stage line from Leavenworth via 
Fredonia, Milltown, Proctersville, Paoli, Orleans, Bedford, 
Springville, Bloomington, Martinsville, and Port Royal to 
Indianapolis. This line was intended especially for stu- 
dents going to the State College and for boatmen return- 
ing from down river.^** 

Meanwhile lines were being projected into other parts 
of the State. The heavy immigration into the Wabash coun- 
try soon caused a great amount of travel to Terre Haute, 
Lafayette, and Logansport. As early as 1838, C. Vigus of 
Logansport put on a line of stages from Indianapolis 
through Logansport to Michigan City. At the same time, 
W. L. Ross was making preparations for starting a line 
from Lafayette, through Logansport and Peru to Fort 
Wayne. At Lafayette the Ross stages connected with the 
Indianapolis stage via Crawfordsville, and at Fort Wayne 
connection was made for Toledo. On these lines were beau- 
tiful four-horse coaches carrying the United States mails. 

16 Indiana Journal, May 15, 1835. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 263 

The former line made the trip twice a week from Michigan 
City to the capital. 

In September the Vigus's changed their route so that 
the main line extended from Niles, Michigan, to Indianapo- 
lis. At Niles, it connected with the daily Chicago and De- 
troit stages; at Plymouth, a stage for Laporte and Michi- 
gan City could be had; at Indianapolis, connections could 
be made with daily stages for Dayton and Cincinnati, Mad- 
ison and Terre Haute, or with tri-weekly stages to Cincin- 
nati and Louisville. The bright new stages of the Vigus 
line cost $600 each and were the pride of the settlers along 
the way.^'^ 

Traveling in the early coaches was not unmixed pleas- 
ure. If the roads were dry, the passengers had to hold on 
tightly as the stage bounced from rock to rock. If the roads 
were wet, there was danger from overturning. In 1838 a 
stage mired and turned over on Washington street, Indian- 
apolis, seriously injuring several of the occupants. Cross- 
ing streams was attended with risk. The roadway may 
have been washed away, leaving the stage to turn over. 
Congressman John Test had his leg broken in 1830, when 
the Cincinnati stage turned over in crossing Mill creek.^^ 

§ 51 Opening Streams for Navigation 

The second plan of the General Assembly to secure in- 
ternal communication was to open up the streams for navi- 
gation. The natural features of the State easily lent them- 
selves to this plan. The southern boundary was a naviga- 
ble river from which numerous tributaries led into the in- 
terior. On the west was the Wabash, crossing the State 
diagonally, and sending off large branches to almost every 
county. The northeast was accessible from the Maumee, 
while the northwest had the St. Joseph river and Lake 
Michigan. Unfortunately, all the streams, except the Ohio, 
were too small for successful navigation ; but it was 

1" These advertisements are found in the Logansport Telegraph, the 
Indiana Journal, and Indiana Democrat of Indianapolis, the Madison 
Courier, and the Lafayette Free Press. 

i& Indiana Demoo)~at, Dec. 4, 1830. 



264 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

thought that, by clearing them of snags and bars, they 
could be made navigable for pirogues and small flatboats. 
They would thus answer the purpose of highways, at least 
for the present. The first step in transforming these 
streams into highways was to declare them navigable wa- 
terways, thus forbidding their obstruction by milldams and 
bridges.!-* 

This work was begun during the Fourth Session of the 
General Assembly at Corydon. By a combination bill ap- 
proved January 17, 1820, almost every creek large enough 
to float a sawlog was opened, so far as a statute without an 
appropriation would effect it.-^' Later the General Assem- 
bly tried a different plan.-^ January 21, 1826, John Eaton, 
Jacob Wolf, and Joseph Latshaw were commissioned to 
clear Busseron creek from Eaton's mills to its mouth in 
the Wabash above Vincennes. Log creek in Switzerland 
county, Plumb creek in the same county, Big Indian creek 
in Morgan county. Lick creek in Orange county, Lost river 
in Orange county, Mississinewa river from Marion to Peru, 
Brushy Fork of Muscatatuck, and Eel river up into Put- 

19 The ordinance of 17S7 provided tliat: "Tlie nrivigable waters lead- 
ing into tlie Mississippi and St. liavvreuce. aiad the carrjing jjlaces be- 
tween the same, sliall be common highways, and forever free, as well to 
the inhabitants of said territory as to the citizens of the United St.ites. 
and those of any other State that may be admitted into the Confeder- 
acy, without any tax. imiwst or duty therefor." This plainly meant 
"Navigable" for the canoes and bateaux then used for navigation, and 
the early legislation was based on that undei*standing. 

-•» Laws of Indiana, 1820, ch — , p. 59. By this law White river to 
the forks at Daviess county: West fork to the Delaware towns near 
Mimcie; East fork to Flat Rock in Shelby <-ounty: ^Muscatatuck from its 
mouth to Vernon: Big Blue to Fredericksburg near the south line of 
Washington county: W^hitewater from the north boundary of Fayette 
county to the Ohio: Anderson from its mouth at Troy to the Hurricane 
fork near St. Meiurad: Poison creek to Cumming's mill; Oil creek to 
Aaron Cunningham's mill (the two latter entirely in Perry county) ; 
Raccoon creek in Parke county to Brook's mill: Big creek to Black's 
mill: Loughrey creek in Ohio county up to Hartford: Patoka river to 
Moseby's mill ; Indian creek in Ilai-rison county : Indian Kentucky ci-eek 
for a few miles in Jefferson county up to Brook's mill : Little Pigeon 
and Rig Pigeon creeks, the latter at Evansville, the former between 
Spencer and Warrick counties: Big Sand creek to its forks near Scipio 
in Jennings county, were all declared navigable streams. 

21 Lans of Indiana, 1825. chs. 34, 35. 36. 37, 38. 39. 40. See also ibid. 
1826, chs. 29, 40. 41. 42, and 1827. chs. 42, 43. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 265 

nam county, were likewise put in commission. The county 
boards of justices had chief control of most of this work. 

The commissioners were empowered to call out the 
"hands" living within two miles of the stream to help clear 
it. Little serious effort was ever spent on any of the minor 
streams, but great hopes were built on the possibilities of 
the White and Wabash rivers. It was confidently believed 
that White river could be opened to year-round navigation 
for boats of large tonnage. Much labor was spent on these 
streams, but the recurring freshets kept the rivers full of 
drifts and uprooted trees. The journals of the General 
Assembly contain numerous petitions to break up drifts 
that had interrupted navigation. The streams formed the 
main outlet for the surplus farm products of their valleys. 
Flatboats were built, loaded in convenient pools, and, when 
the water reached the proper stage, were floated down to 
the Wabash and Ohio, then either reshipped or taken to 
New Orleans. Hundreds of these went down the Wabash 
every year. 

Upstream navigation was well-nigh impossible, but was 
occassionally resorted to when roads were impassable. It 
was difficult to get along the shore with a tow line, so the 
only way to propel a boat upstream was with sharp poles 
set against the bottom. This plan was used most on the 
upper Wabash from Lafayette to Logansport and Peru. 
Steamboats rarely went above Lafayette, and for several 
years an extensive commerce in salt and manufactured 
goods was carried on, between that place and upstream 
towns, by means of pole boats. For this purpose they used 
a flat-bottomed boat thirty to forty feet long, with four 
foot guards, along which six or eight men walked and 
pushed with spike poles set against the bottom. In this 
manner three or four tons could be transported eight to 
ten miles a day. 

Merchants from the river towns frequently induced 
masters of small steamers to undertake to navigate the 
smaller rivers. In 1828 merchants from Indianapolis, Spen- 
cer, and Bloomington chartered the steamer "Triton," fifty- 
two tons burden, to carry a cargo from Louisville. It left 



266 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Louisville April 24 and in four days reached a drift four- 
teen miles below Spencer.-- Two years later the "Trav- 
eler," under Captain Smith, reached Spencer in three days 
from Louisville. As early as 1827 Noah Noble, later gov- 
ernor, tried to induce the Kanawha Salt Company to send 
a steamer to Indianapolis, but was unsuccessful. The "Vic- 
tory" came within fifty miles of the capital during the year, 
but was compelled to turn back. 

On April 11, 1831, there appeared in White river, at 
Indianapolis, a real steamboat, the "Robert Hanna." Not 
only was there a real steamboat, but it was pushing a heav- 
ily laden keel barge. The citizens of Indianapolis had al- 
ways claimed that White river was navigable. Now who 
could deny it? No excitement in the history of the town 
compared to this. Every man, woman and child lined up on 
the banks of the river. There was no time for sleep that 
night. Early the next day Capt. B. I. Blythe paraded his 
artillery company on the bank and fired a salute. The cap- 
tain of the boat then offered to take the ladies who wished 
to go on an excursion up the river. There was no lack of 
volunteers and the gallant captain had to make a second 
trip.23 The boat had been purchased by Hanna & Com- 
pany, contractors on the National Road, to be used to haul 
stone from the Port Royal Bluffs for the big bridge across 
White river. The boat was not built on the lines required 
and had to be sent back. 

On its return trip it ran on a bar at Hog Isand, a few 
miles down, and lay there till winter. However, the event 
added greatly to the reputation of the capital and limited 
the swaggering of the members from the river cities, Madi- 
son, New Albany, and Vincennes. 

There were many attempts in the early years of Indi- 
ana to pilot steamboats up to the upper Wabash towns. 
The best water came in March usually. In 1821 Mr. Lin- 
ton, a trader from Terre Haute, had a steamer run to that 
town, which they estimated to be three hundred miles from 

22 Indiana Journal, May 15, 1828. 

23 Indiana Journal. April 16, 1831. 




EiVEKS AND Streams of Indiana. 



268 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the Ohio.-^ A merchant of Lafayette, named Elston, 
freighted a steamer to that town as early as 1825. On 
March 24, 1830, Capt. John Moon, of Ripley, Ohio, ran the 
"Paragon" to the mouth of Rock creek, about twelve miles 
below Logansport. He reported good water — six and one- 
half feet — on the bar below Logansport. These reports, 
and the fact that boats could be loaded anywhere along the 
river for the New Orleans market, brought a rush of 
settlers. 

The steamer "American," James L. Wilson, master, was 
during the time making regular trips from Louisville to 
Terre Haute.-^ 

The steamer "Lawrence" from Cincinnati, 125 tons 
burden, chartered by Sloan and Landes, reached Covington 
March 18, 1827, only six months after the sale of lots for 
that town had been held. The same year a steamer made 
its way up to Lafayette.-** 

The shopkeepers of Delphi and Peru had tried, unsuc- 
cessfully for some years to secure regular navigation up to 
those towns.-' Finally, they prevailed on the master of the 

24 Miami Times quoted iu Tiic Western Sun. May 8, 1830. 

-5 Fi-om the Western Sun of Ajiril 25, 182!>, tlie following: river iiewst 
is taken: April 17, "Criterion" arrived from Lafayette to Shawnee- 
town ; 18, "Viotory"' from Lafayette to Louisville; IS), "Wm. Tell" from 
Cincinnati to Lafayette; 21, "Criterion" i-eturaed from Sliawneetown 
with a barge of salt In tow. From the s;nne pi.per. Ajiril 2C. 1831, is 
the following: April 10. "PeiU-!" from Shawneetown to Eugene; April 

17, "Fairy" froni Louisville to Lafayette; April 18, "Pearl" on return to 
Shawneetown; April 20. "Forester" from Lafayette to Louisville: April 

18. "Java" Louisville to Eugene : on the 23. the "Experiment" made the 
trip, the first on record, from New Orleans direct to Terre Haute. 

In the issue of March 27, 1834, these arrivals at Vincennes were 
noted: March 22, '"Camden" from Lafayette, and "Shylock" from the 
mouth of the Wabash; 24, "Salem" from Pittsburg, and "Tennessee" 
from Lafayette; 25. "Logansport" from Deli)hi : "Sabine" from Pittsburg: 
"Fairy" from the mouth of the Wabiish: 2(5. "Tide" from Lafayette: 
"Wm. Hurlbut" from Cincinnati: on 20. "Monroe" and "Salem" down 
from Lafayette. From April 14 to 27, forty-one boats landed at Terre 
Haute. The "Indian" was built that sin-ing expressly to do the carry- 
ing trade from Cincinnati to Lafayette. While the stage of water would 
permit — during February, March and Aiiril — there was at le.ist one boat 
per day at the Vincennes wharf. 

-fi Indiana Gazette, April 3, 1827. 

-" Sanford Cox, RecrjUections of an Old Settler, Lafayette (ISGO). 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 269 

little steamer, "Republican," to make a trial trip. Accord- 
ingly, on the June rise, 1834, the start was made with a 
number of Logansport men on board, and also the interested 
merchants. The boat moved along beautifully till, a few 
miles above the Delphi landing, it began to strike. The 
crew had to get out at sandbars and lift and push. Haw- 
sers were run ashore and used as tow lines. Finally it 
struck the Georgetown Bar and stuck fast. Captain Towe, 
as well as Colonel Pollard and Job Eldridge, who had goods 
aboard, got out in the water and pushed and hauled. It was 
no use. Twenty yoke of cattle were hitched on and the 
little "Republican," shorn of much of her prestige, but still 
alive, steamed into the harbor at Logansport. The return 
trip was never attempted. The boat bilged and sank near 
the mouth of Eel river.- ^ This, if not the first, w^as among 
the first of the steamboats that ever went up so far. The 
soundings taken by the "Republican" showed that Delphi 
could be reached easily; and the next year a petition was 
sent to Congress by the Delphians asking that that place 
be made a port of entry. 

A like excitement was caused on the St. Joseph three 
years later when the "Matilda Barney" steamed down to 
the South Bend on her way to Elkhart and Goshen. She had 
on board one hundred passengers and ten tons of freight, 
and was drawing thirteen inches of water. Everybody in 
reach rushed to the banks to see the wonder. Land along 
the river rose over night from $5 to $10 per acre.'-*' The 
most promising point along the river at that time was the 
iron foundry at Mishawaka. 

§ 52 The Flatboat Trade 

It is not beyond the fact to say that nine-tenths of the 
surplus produce of Indiana from 1820 to 1840 was carried 
to market on flatboats. The merchants did most, but by 
no means all, of the boating business. Early in the spring 
they put their boat carpenters to work. The finest poplars 

-8 Dr. J;imes H. Stewart, RccoUcvtioiis of Carroll Vonnlij, Ciuciunati, 
1873. 

29 Western. Bun, May 31, 1834. 



270 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

in the neighboring forest were marked for gunwales. Some 
of these were eighty feet long. They were usually cut be- 
fore the sap rose in the spring and left in the woods as long 
as possible to season. By the first of the following March 
the boats must be completed and at the landing ready for 
loading. The loading of the boats was no ordinary event in 
the neighborhood. The produce had all been prepared be- 
forehand and in many cases had been stored in a warehouse 
at the landing. The owners of the boats watched the stage 
of the water, and when it was thought to be favorable, they 
sent word to everybody in the neighborhood either to bring 
in their produce or come with all hands and the teams to 
load the boats. It was usual for the women to come also, 
not only to cook for the hands, but to help wrap and store 
away the goods on the boat. It was a time of great gaiety. 
On the bank stood a barrel of whiskey with its head knocked 
in and a gourd to drink from. When the loading was done 
and the boats gone, a frolic at the nearest and most com- 
modious house or barn closed the event. 

By 1827 the New Orleans market was failing, not on* 
account of the quantity of produce, but on account of the 
time and manner of reaching it. Three-fourths of the mar- 
ketable produce of the Mississippi Valley was run out in 
March. This deluge struck New Orleans all at once; and, 
it being a small city, was unable to care for it till it could 
be shipped to New York. In the spring of 1826, one hun- 
dred and fifty-two flatboats passed Vincennes loaded for 
New Orleans. They carried 250,000 bushels of corn, 100,- 
000 barrels of pork, 10,000 hams, 2,500 live cattle, 10,000 
pounds of beeswax, 3,600 venison hams, besides hogs, oats, 
meal, chickens, etc.-'"^' From these statistics it is evident 
that about three hundred flatboats left the Wabash each 
year. 

From Lawrenceburg to Mount Vernon on the Ohio there 
was scarcely a five mile stretch but what had its "landing," 
where flatboats were loaded for the down-river trade. In 
1828 David Guard & Brothers, farmers on the river above 
Lawrenceburg, bought the abandoned steamer "Scioto" and 

•■"> Western Snn, .Tune 17, 1826. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 271 

transformed it into a barge, on which they placed 600 live 
hogs, a large number of fat cattle, chickens, geese, corn, 
500 kegs of lard, 500 barrels of pork, and other produce, all 
from their own farm, and set out, March 10, for New Or- 
leans.^i 

From this same port twenty-seven such boats were run 
in one year. Down below, at Vevay, the Dufours and 
Schencks, known by their products throughout the east, 
loaded their annual fleet with wine, hay, straw hats, and 
other produce of this energetic French community. Madi- 
son, the center of the pork-packing industry in the State, 
did the largest down river business of any town in the 
State. Not only from the river-board but from the tribu- 
tary streams, such as Pigeon and Anderson, Oil and Blue, 
Indian and Loughry, came numberless boats. Scores of 
busy little town-landings of that day have completely dis- 
appeared from the map. Such were Maysville, Hindostan, 
Palestine, Fredonia, Pittsburg, Port Royal and Darlington. 

Passengers and pilots on upstream steamboats counted 
hundreds of flatboats in a single day. John Matthews, a 
veteran boatman of Indiana, commenting on the large num- 
ber of boatmen at New Orleans in the spring of 1829, ob- 
served that over half were from Indiana. ■'- 

As far as possible the boatmen gathered in groups, 
often ten to twenty boats keeping company. When a fleet 
of them tied up in a down-river port like Paducah, Natchez, 
Vicksburg, or Plaquemine the crews had high revels. Old 
rivermen indulged in all kinds of jokes on green hands, 
then on their first trip. At New Orleans there were sights 
to keep all on the alert. The splendor of the theatres, gar- 
dens, churches, and stores were such as the young boatmen 
had never dreamed of. Scarcely an hour was spent in 
sleep during the three or four days' stay by those on their 
first trip. 

The merchant or master was busy during this time dis- 
posing of his cargo and buying goods with the proceeds. 
Little cash was brought back to Indiana. The return trip 

31 Laicrericehiirff Palladium., March 15. 1828. 

32 Indiana Journal, August 1, 1834. 



272 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

was not so pleasant for the boatmen as the going. Until 
about 1840 most of the men returned on foot. This was not 
only tiresome but dangerous. The down-river country, and 
especially the roads frequented by returning boatmen, were 
infested by thieves and robbers. Gangs of gamblers, mur- 
derers, and river pirates preyed on' the commerce from 
Cairo to New Orleans. Frequently, as in the case of the 
one at Cave-in-the-Rocks, Illinois, pirate bands were strong 
enough to overpower a flatboat crew and rob them. 

After 1840, or thereabouts, the boatmen returned by 
steamer to the nearest Ohio river town, and thence walked 
home. Those from the Wabash towns landed at Evans- 
ville; those from the central part of the State landed at 
Leavenvv^orth, or New Albany. 

§ 53 Early Mail Service 

The chief means of communication between Indianians 
and the outside world was the United States mails. These 
were necessarily infrequent and irregular. The mail routes 
were laid out and the service directed by Congress, and 
there seems at this date to have been little cause for com- 
plaint by the pioneers. Sometimes the carrier was delayed 
a few days by high water. Frequently he was drowned 
in trying to swim his horse across a flooded river. More 
frequently the postmasters took the newspapers from the 
bags and detained them until next trip — often a week — that 
they might read them. In 1827 the publishers of the In- 
diana Journal complained that half their papers were so 
detained. 

At the same time the editor explained that he had is- 
sued no paper the previous week because the mails from 
Cincinnati had been delayed two weeks by high waters. 
There were at that time thirty routes in the State. Nearly 
all were weekly. On one the mail left Lawrenceburg at two 
p. m. Monday and arrived at Indianapolis at six p. m. 
Wednesday. This was a fair example of the service. 

"Franked" congressional documents often clogged the 
mails to the exclusion of more important matter. Captain 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 273 

Sample, the postmaster at Connersville in 1828, complained 
that he had over a wagon load of this material, nearly all 
franked by T. P. Moore, a congressman from Kentucky, to 
Jonathan McCarty — the Jacksonian candidate for Congress 
in that district. 

The postal receipts during the year 1828 for Indianapo- 
lis were $379 ; Brookville, $142 ; Crawf ordsviFle, $139 ; Fort 
Wayne, S158 ; Terre Haute, $235 ; Madison, $323. For the 
whole State it was $7,905. There were then one hundred 
and forty-nine offices in the State, thirty-seven of which 
had been established that year.-^-^ The development, how- 
ever, was rapid. At the beginning of 1830 Indianapolis 
had a weekly mail to Madison, Louisville, Elizabethtown, 
Ky., Petersburg, Terre Haute, Mooresville, Noblesville, 
Lawrenceburg. and twice a week to Brookville, and to Day- 
ton.^^^ 

§ 54 Settlement of the Wabash Country 

No description can give an accurate impression of the 
settlement of Indiana. One who has watched the rising 
waters of a flood overflow the land will appreciate the over- 
flow of the State by the swelling tide of immigration. By 
1825 the settlers were entei'ing the northern half of the 
State. The "New Purchase" in 1818 opened almost all the 
land south of the Wabash to settlement. 

As noted in the last chapter, land sales at Crawfords- 
ville had been opened by Ambrose Whitlock and William- 
son Dunn December 24, 1824, though there was no per- 
manent land office established there till 1828.''' 

Crawfordsville became the converging point for all set- 
tlers northwest of the capital. The first settlers of Lafay- 

^^Amerivan State Pupcrs. Poxt Office. I, 208. 

S4 Indiana Journal, .Tau. 16. 1830. In 1832 tlie South Bend North 
Western Pioneer announced witli great pride tliat South Bend had a 
twice-a-week mail from Piqua, Ohio. Before that a weel^ly mail from 
Fort Wayne had been suflicient; cf. Waldo Mitchell. '"Growth of Indiana. 
1812-1820." Indiana Magazine of Histori/, Dec. 1914. where a number of 
the early routes are given. 

35 Sanford C. Cox, Recollections of the IJiuiii fiettleinent of the ^Ya- 
bash Yalley, 17. 



274 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ette and Delphi, and what was then called the upper Wa- 
bash country, made their way from the upper Whitewater 
Valley across by Andersontown, thence down White river 
to Strawtown near Noblesville. There they took the Wil- 
derness road by Thorntown to Crawfordsville. From White 
river to Crawfordsville there was not a white man's house 
along this trace in 1825.^'^ A score of families constituted 
the little settlement at Crawfordsville and then the forest 
stretched unbroken to Terre Haute. 

Along this trace, in October, 1824, came Sanford Cox, 
his father, mother, brothers and sisters, among the first 
to reach the Wabash country by this overland route. The 
Robinson family, Henry and his sons, Abner and Coleman, 
their wives and children, from Dayton, Ohio, had preceded 
the Coxes by only a few days. At Crawfordsville they se- 
lected their land, and cut a trace for their wagon into Car- 
roll county, the earliest settlers in the vicinity of Delphi. ■^'" 

The whole country to the northwest of Montgomery 
county was then known as Wabash county and was at- 
tached to Montgomery for administrative purposes. Early 
in the spring of 1825 Robert Johnson, the tavern keeper of 
Crawfordsville, surveyed for William Digby the town site 
for Lafayette. In January, 1828, Tippecanoe county was 
set off by the General Assembly and in May following the 
commissioners located the county seat at Lafayette. ■'^^ 

Almost at the same time, March 28, 1826, John Tipton 
moved the Fort Wayne Indian Agency to the mouth of Eel 
river. April 16, 1828, the town site of Logansport was sur- 

36 "Soou after crossing White river wo iiassed BeckwitLi's place. 3.1r. 
Ogle, who drove the (ox) team told us to take a good look at that cabin 
as it was the last we would see for forty miles." Sanford Cox. Recol- 
lections, 11. 

■"7 Dr. .James Hervey Stewart. h'cc'iJIrclions of the Early fiettleincnt 
of Carroll County, 1.3. 

38 Dr. E. V. Shockley. in an article entitled "County Seats and Coun- 
ty Seat Wars," Indiana Magazine of History, March. 1914. has gi\eu 
the location of the different county seats of the counties of Indiana, 
showing the time, manner, and inducements, that led up to them. In 
the case of Lafayette the proprietor gave the even numbered lots to the 
county as a price for the location. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 275 

veyed, and August 12, 1829, it became the county seat of 
Cass county.'^" 

Fort Wayne had been the seat of a military post or 
Indian agency for nearly a century before any real settle- 
ment was made. In 1822 a land office was established there 
under charge of Joseph Holman and Samuel C. Vance. The 
first land sale was opened at the fort, October 22, 1823. 
Squatters and traders, such as Samuel Hanna, James Bar- 
nett, Alexander Ewing, Samuel Comparet and others, had 
already settled there. The General Assembly of 1823 laid 
out Alien county, the county seat being located the follow- 
ing year at Fort Wayne.^^^ 

As early as 1823 Alexis Coquillard, a fur trader, estab- 
lished a station where the city of South Bend now stands. 
Lathrop Taylor soon followed. The station was an outpost 
of Fort Wayne. Real settlers soon followed and by the time 
the Michigan Road reached the place a considerable settle- 
ment had sprung up.^' 

Settlers entered Lake county by way of Lake Michigan 
and the "Old Sac Trail." The Indian title to this section 
was not secured till 1828 and 1832. The Black Hawk War 
in the latter year scared away prospective settlers, but in 
1833 a stage line from Detroit to Fort Dearborn, passing 
through, opened up the country to settlement. 

It is thought that the first settlement in the region was 
made by a tavern keeper named Bennett, who located his 
hostelry near the mouth of the Calumet. Traces ran from 
Laporte to Hickory creek, Illinois, passing Cedar Lake. 
This latter was called the "Old Sac Trail."-'-^ 

Settlers had established homes on the prairies about 
Laporte as early as 1830, there being about 100 families 
in that neighborhood by the close of 1832, when Laporte 
county was organized. ^•'• 

These settlements indicate the main lines of immigra- 

■ 39 "w. Swift Wright. Pastime Sketches. This is a series of articles 
written for, and read to the Cass County Historical Society. 

40 Wallace A. Brice, History of F'ort Wayne, 29.3. 

41 Judge Timothy E. Howard, A History of St. Joseph County, 132. 

42 Rev. T. H. Ball, Lake County, Indiana, 20. 

43 Gen. Jasper Packard, History of LaPorte County, .36. 



276 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

tion, but only the main lines. Thousands came up the Wa- 
bash ; others came by trail to the Wabash from Lake Michi- 
gan, a harbor having been made on the Indiana shore as 
early as 1834.^^ 

"Nothing is more common," wrote Rev, George Bush, 
of Indianapolis, November 20, 1826, "than to see fifteen or 
twenty w^agons passing in a single day, each carrying the 
little belongings of the family that trudged along by its 
side. Indiana is now teeming with the hordes of immigra- 
tion. As many as thirty wagons camp together for the 
night."^-^ 

"For a week our town has scarce been clear of immi- 
grant wagons," wrote the editor of the Indiana Gazette, of 
Indianapolis, October 30, 1827.^'' It was reported that 200 
families passed through Centerville for the Wabash count- 
try during the two months of September and October, 1827. 
Since 1820 there had been organized in the "New Purchase" 
twenty-one counties whose population in 1827 totaled 55,- 
000.^' There was no cessation in this rush of settlers. Dur- 
ing the years from 1829 to 1835 the flood poured along the 
roads that centered in Indianapolis. From there they took 
the Crawfordsville, Logansport, or Terre Haute trails. The 
canal agitation, which began in 1827, quickened the move- 
ment and swelled the crowd. Sales of canal lands all along 
the route attracted speculators, city builders, and settlers 
in ever increasing numJoers. Cities like Lagro, Peru, Mia- 
misport, Pittsburg, Logansport, Lockport, Lafayette, Wil- 
liamsport, Eugene, Attica and Covington sprang up in a 
season and became flourishing towns. ^"^ 

4-1 JiididiKt -I (III nidi. .TriU. IS, is:^4. 

45 Rev. (ieorjie Bush, to Corres])oii(lin.g Secretary of the Home Mis- 
sion Society, Indiana Gazette, April 3, 1.S27. "Tlieir destination is the 
Wabash above Terre Haute. We wonder wh.v a merciful providence kept 
this country hid from civilized man. or why he did not create an espe- 
cially gifted race for its occupation." 

•I't; Indiana Gazette, Oct. 30. 1827. 

47 Western 8un. Nov. 10, 1S27. 

48 Paoli Patriot, Oct. 9. 1S34. "We presume not less than one hun- 
dred and tift.v wagons have passeii through this village in the last two 
AA'eeks." Indianapolis Indiana Detnocrat. "Our streets are one moving 
mass of living men. women, and children, carriages. w;!gons. cattle. 



ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT 277 

The bulk of population, as shown by the census of 1830, 
was still in the southern part of the State, The White- 
water Valley was most thickly settled. Wayne county, with 
a population of 18,589; Dearborn, with 13,955; Jefferson, 
with 11,465 ; Franklin, with 10,719, were the leading coun- 
ties. The immense throng of settlers, then crowding to the 
Wabash frontier, passed through these counties and thou- 
sands became permanent residents, who had intended to go 
to the Wabash.49 

Another large body of population was located, roughly 
speaking, in the triangle of hilly country with its base 
resting on the Ohio from Madison to Leavenworth and its 
apex at Crawfordsvilie. Most of these settlers had entered 
through Clark county, which then contained 10,719 persons. 

As an evidence of the heavy immigration into the Wa- 
bash country, Tippecanoe county had a population of 7,167 ; 
Fountain had 7,644, either equal to that of Marion, with 
7,181, or Montgomery, with 7,386.-5o 

horses, hogs ;ind sheep, all joyously wentliug their way to their new 
habitations. The old, middle aged, and young go together. Nor is this 
moving spirit confined to one part of our State alone, but we believe 
tens of thousands are going by the lakes, and every leading road abounds 
with similar trains of emigrants." The Indiana Journal, Sept. 8, 1830, 
called attention to the heavy immigration then pouring through Indi.-ui- 
apolis. The capital that year had a population of 1,09-1 ; Viucennes 1,560 : 
Salem 853; Madison 1,752. The newspapers were filled with the adver- 
tisements of towns. Andersontown, Knightstown, Muncytown 1827, Del- 
phi 1828, Blakesbury. Brentonville, Marion, .Alooresville 1830, Lebanon. 
New Maysville, South Bend. LaPorte 1832, Michigan City, Allisonvillo 

1833, New Bethel, ilonticello, Plymouth. Germantovvn, Northfield, Peru 

1834, will give some idea how fast these towns were laid out and placed 
on the markets. The date given is the first advertisement for the s-ile 
of lots. There were scores of towns laid out and advertised which can 
not now be located on the map. 

-t^Dr. James Hervey Stewart, Recollections of the Early Settlement 
of Carroll County, 12, "On passing through Richmond and Centerville 
we were annoyed by croaking predictions of ill-luck uttered on all sides. 
'You will never get through' said one, 'You will die if you go to the 
Wabash: every one that goes there dies in less than ;i year,' said an- 
other." 

50 Fcroy Messenger, Sept. 27. 18.31. gave the following census report 
of Indiana for 1830 : 

County. Census. County. Census. (Jounty. Census. 

Allen 1,000 Clark 10.719 Carroll 1.614 

Bartholomew — 5.480 Crawford 3,234 Clay 1,616 

(19) 



278 



HISTORY OF INDIANA 



County. Census. 
Booue 622 

Dearborn 13.955 

Decatur 5.851 

Delaware 2,372 

Daviess 4,512 

Dubois 1.774 

Elkhart — 935 

Franklin 10,990 

Fayette 9,112 

Fountain 7.644 

Floyd 9,368 

Gibson 5,417 

Greene 4,253 

Hancock 1,569 

Harrison 10,088 

Hendricks 3,667 

Henry 6,498 

Hamilton 1,750 

Jefferson 11,465 



County. Census. 

Clinton 1,423 

Jackson 4.894 

Johnson 4.139 

Jennings 3,950 

Knox 6,557 

Lawrence 9,239 

Martin 2,010 

Madison 2.242 

Marion 7,181 

Montgomery 7,386 

Morgan 579 

Monroe 5,678 

Orange 5,909 

Owen 7,090 

Posey 4,883 

Perry 6.378 

Putnam 8,495 

Pike 2,464 

Parke 7,534 



County. Census. 

Cass 1,154 

Rush 9,918 

Ripley 3,959 

Randolph 3,912 

Sullivan 4,696 

St. Joseiih 287 

Switzerland 7,111 

Scott 3,097 

Spencer 3,187 

Shelby 6,294 

Tippecanoe 7,167 

Union 7,957 

Vanderburgh __ 2,610 

Vigo 5,736 

Vermillion 5.706 

Washington 

Warren 2,854 

Warrick 2,973 

Wayne 18,589 

Total 344,508 



CHAPTER XII 

religion and education in early indiana 

§ 55 Churches 

There was periodical preaching among the Indiana set- 
tlers from the earliest years of the nineteenth century. The 
log houses and barns of the settlers were used as meeting 
houses. Occasionally a rough pulpit was erected in the 
grove and more or less regular services held in the shade of 
the trees. Itinerant priests and preachers were pressed into 
service. Many of these were merely accidental visitors, 
others were traveling under the direction of eastern mis- 
sionary societies. 

The earliest church organization in Indiana was the 
Catholic at Vincennes. The records of this parish church 
date back to 1749. From this date to 1834, when Bishop 
Gabriel Brute became the bishop of Vincennes, thirty priests 
had served in succession. The earlier priests, particularly 
Bishop Flaget, had traveled over Indiana, ministering to 
the Catholic settlers, revalidating marriages, administering 
sacraments, and receiving converts into communion. Only 
traditional evidence remains of the ministrations of this 
clergyman.^ 

With the appointment of Bishop Brute, Vincennes, 
which had formerly belonged to the diocese of Bardstown, 
Kentucky, became an independent see. His jurisdiction in- 
cluded Indiana and much of Illinois. As soon as the new 
St. Francis Xavier cathedral church at Vincennes was dedi- 

1 Eev. Herman Alerding, A History of the Catholic Church in the 
Diocese of Vincennes, 92. In 1823 and again in 1825 Bishop Flaget 
traveled from New Albany to Vincennes holding church at such places 
as New Albany, the Knobs, Mt. Pleasant, Washington, and Black Oak 
Ridge. At Vincennes in an eight day meeting he securetl three hundred 
converts. 



280 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

cated Bishop Brute and the resident priest, Lalumiere, 
started on a tour of the State.- 

The Catholic settlers were gathered into congregations 
at suitable places and priests sent them as soon as possible. 
Bishop Brute was a man of remarkable activity, and, by 
the time of his death, June 26, 1839, had the State well or- 
ganized." 

The first session of the Indiana Conference of the Metho- 
dist Episcopal Church was held at New Albany in 1832. 
There were represented in the conference five presiding 
elders' districts. These were Madison, Charlestown, Indi- 
anapolis, Vincennes, and the Missionary district covering 
the whole northern part of the State. ^ There were reported 
at this time 19,853 white members and 182 colored. There 
were sixty preachers appointed and four charges left un- 
supplied. These were under the direction of five presiding 
elders. There was scarcely a nook or corner of the State 
not reached by the famous circuit riders of this church. 

As early as 1804 Peter Cartwright and Benjamin Lakin, 
who were then riding the Shelby and Salt River Circuits in 
Kentucky, crossed over and preached in Clark's Grant. The 
principal gathering places of the early Methodists was at 
the home of the Robinsons and Prathers near Charlestown."^ 

Mr. Cartwright also organized the first Methodist 
church in southwestern Indiana, in the Busroe Settlement, 
about this time. These converts were organized into a class 
in 1808.6 Whitewater Circuit, in western Ohio, was organ- 

2 In the Western Sun (Vincennes), March 4. 1826. is a notice by 
Father Chanipomier that the cornerstone of the new Cathedral Church 
would be laid March 30. Catholics and Protestants alike were invited 
and Protestants aided liberally in the work of construction. Nov. 6, 
following, the unfinished walls were thrown down by a violent wind. 
Indiana and Illinois then constituted the diocese. This was by far the 
finest church building in the State. 

3 Alerding, A History of the Diocese of Vincennes. 121-161. The 
bishop was buried in the sanctuary of the Cathedral of Vincennes where 
his body still remains. 

4 Rev. F. C. Holliday. Indiana Methodism, 75. 

5 Nathan Robinson moved to Indiana from Kentucky in 1799 and 
was perhaps the pioneer Methodist of the State. Stevens. History of 
Methodism, IV, 152. 153 : Sweet, Indiana Magazine of History. Dec, 1914. 

6 Peter Cartwright, Autobiography. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 281 

ized in 1806, soon after, including among its charges 
Brookville, Liberty and Connersville, In 1807 the Silver 
Creek Circuit, in Clark county, was organized and placed 
under the charge of Rev. Moses AshworthJ 

In 1808 Indiana District was organized, including parts 
of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Among the noted 
preachers who devoted their lives to this work were Moses 
Crume, Josiah Crawford, Samuel Parker and William Wi- 
nans. The latter is said to have been the first Protestant 
preacher to visit Vincennes. On one of his early visits he 
preached in the fort to the officers, a few English and 
French settlers, and a small number of Indians. Governor 
Harrison held the candle, by the light of which he read his 
text.8 

In 1816 the Western Conference, of which Indiana Cir- 
cuit had been a part, was broken and the Missouri Con- 
ference established. The Whitewater Valley was placed in 
the Ohio Conference and the rest of the State in the Mis- 
souri Conference. All told, there were seven circuits in the 
State at the time. 

In 1824 the Illinois Conference was established, to in- 
clude Illinois and Indiana. It held its first annual meeting 
at Charlestown, August 25, 1825. There were then four 
districts, with thirty-one circuits and stations. At the next 
meeting, which was held at Bloomington, September 28, 
1826, the reports showed a membership in Indiana of 10,- 
840. 

No other church grew so rapidly during the pioneer 
period. A succession of able preachers, such as Jay C. 
Smith,-' Allen Wiley,^'^ Peter Cartwright.^i John Schrader, 
Richard Hargrave, William Cravens and scores of others, 
left evidence of their power not only in the remarkable or- 
ganization of the church but on the political and educa- 

7 F. C Holliday, Indiana Methodism, 26. 
SF. C. Holliday, Indiana Methodism, 28. 
■ 9 Reminiscences of Early Methodism in Indiana, 1870. 

10 Ufe and Times of Rev. Alien Wileii. by Rev. F. C. Holliday, 1853 ; 
Bketches of Western Methodism, by James B. Finley. 1856 ; Scenes in 
My Life. Rev. Mark Trafton. 1878. 

11 AtttoMograpJnj of Peter Curtirright. 



{y 



282 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

tional institutions of the State. Among early Methodist 
laymen were such as Dennis Pennington, Ezra Ferris, 
James Scott, Isaac Dunn. 

Unclean politics had headquarters at this time in the 
bar-rooms of the taverns. On these the Methodists made 
ceaseless war. On the other hand, many circuit riders 
preached regularly in bar-rooms, the tavern keeper main- 
taining excellent order during the time. It is said the first 
sermons heard in New Albany and Rising Sun were 
preached in bar-rooms. ^- 

The Baptist was the pioneer Protestant church in In- 
diana. The first church of this denomination was organ- 
ized at Owen's creek, near the Falls of the Ohio, in Knox 
county, November 22, 1798. There seems to have been 
four members. 1"' The congregation met either at Owen's 
creek, Fourteen Mile creek, or Silver creek. At the meeting 
of August 8, 1801, they chose delegates to the Salem, Ken- 
tucky, Association and thus became a regularly organized 
church. March 21, 1812, the allied churches of Silver Creek, 
Mount Pleasant, Fourteen Mile, Knob Creek, Indian Creek, 
Upper Blue River, Lower Blue River, Camp Creek, Salem, 
and White River formed the Silver Creek Association. ^^ 

However, this was not the first but the third association 
formed by this church in Indiana. The first had been or- 
ganized over at Vincennes in 1809, and had been named the 
Wabash. Besides a few Illinois congregations it included 
the Bethel, Patoka, Salem, Wabash, and the famous Maria 
Creek congregations in Indiana. 

The second Indiana association was an offshoot of the old 
Miami Association, and, taking its name from its own local 
Jordan, was called the Whitewater. Loughery Association 
was organized in 1818 ; White River in 1821 ; Flat Rock, 
Little Pigeon and Salem in 1822 ; Liberty and Union in 
1824; Lost River in 1825; Indianapolis in 1826; Coffee 
Creek and Danville in 1827; Madison and Tippecanoe in 
1833 ; Curry's Prairie in 1834 ; Brownstown and White Lick 

12 F. C. HoUiday, Indiana Methodism, 98. 

13 W. T. Stott. Indiana Bapti.H History, 37. 

14 Indiana Baptist History, 77. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 283 

in 1835; Northern in 1836; Bethel in 1837; Freedom and 
Salamonie in 1840; Northeastern in 1841; Bedford, 1842; 
Sand Creek, 1843 ; Judson, 1848 ; Evansville and Long Run, 
1850; Whitewater Valley, 1852; Weasaw Creek, 1853; 
Mount Zion, 1855; Friendship, 1856; Indiana (colored), 
1858. 

This list shows at a glance the heroic work these men 
and women were doing. By 1840 every part of the State 
was reached by their ministers. 

In April, 1833, representatives of twenty-one of these 
associations met at Brandywine church and organized the 
Indiana Baptist Association or Convention. Its purpose 
was to unite all the Baptist churches in Indiana and thus 
conform to the spirit of the time. No early church was 
more energetic than the Baptist until internal dissentions 
over such questions as the origin of evil, missions, educa- 
tion, and ceremonials in a measure disrupted the organiza- 
tion and dissipated its zeal and resources. 

Like the other Protestant churches, the Presbyterian 
made its entrance into Indiana from the neighboring 
charges in Kentucky. Members of the Kentucky churches 
were continually crossing the Ohio into Indiana. Nothing 
more natural than that the preachers would occasionally 
visit their former brethren on the north side of the river, 
or that the Transylvania Presbytery should retain an in- 
terest in its people in their new homes in the wilderness. 
As early as 1804 such preachers as Samuel Rannels, James 
McGready, Thomas Cleland and Samuel B. Robertson 
crossed over from their stations to visit old friends in 
Clark and Knox counties. i"' Even earlier, in 1803, Transyl- 
vania Presbytery, sitting at Danville, Kentucky, determined 
to send missionaries to Indiana. ^f' The records of the Pres- 
bytery show frequent applications by Indiana settlers for 
"supplies," as visiting preachers were called. One of these 
came to the presbytery, in 1805, from Knox county. In 
response Thomas Cleland visited Vincennes and preached 
in the Council house. The youthful preacher was enter- 
ic John M. Dickey. Brief History, 11. 
'^^ Minutes of Transylrama Presbytery. II. 72. 



284 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

tained by Governor Harrison, whose young wife was a 
Presbyterian.^' 

Two years later Samuel Thornton Scott came to "In- 
diana" church as the first residing Presbyterian pastor in 
the State. This church had been organized in 1806 by 
Samuel B. Robertson. The meeting house was the barn of 
Colonel Small, two miles east of Vincennes. A short time 
later Mr. Scott had a pulpit built in the grove, and here at 
"the Presbyterian Stand" the Presbyterians of Vincennes 
and vicinity worshipped for many years. 

The life of such a preacher differed little from that of 
other pioneers except that on Sundays he preached and 
performed other official duties of the church. He received 
no salary worth mentioning for this, but had to depend on 
the produce of his farm and shop for a living. ^« 

In 1807 Palmyra church, near Charlestown, was organ- 
ized, but no resident preacher was stationed there till after 
the War of 1812. In fact this church did not take on a 
permanent organization till 1812. During the winter of 
1812 and 1813 John McElroy Dickey visited the State, 
preaching in Clark and Daviess counties, a church near the 
present city of Washington having been organized a few 
years previously by Mr. Scott, of Vincennes. In May, 1815, 
Dickey moved to Washington and soon became the most 
active worker in the Presbyterian church of Indiana. For 
a third of a century "Father" Dickey traveled over south- 
ern Indiana, preaching and teaching and helping his wife 
incidentally to rear their eleven children. 

1" "In the SpriiiiL; of 1805 I was directed to visit Vincennes r.nd the 
adjoining regions. It was an uninhabited region. I had to go through 
a small wilderness trace with only one residence on the way. in the 
most destitute part of the way, to entertain me during the night. Here 
was my poor horse tied to a tree, ied with grain packed in a wallet from 
Louisville, and myself stretched on the puncheon floor of a small cabin, 
for the nighfs rest." Cleland, Life of Cleland, 87. 

18 There was a certain amount of kindliness shown the preacher, 
which was not expected by others. Hunters often sent a hind qitnrter of 
venison to the preacher, because he could not hunt on Sunday. Tavern 
keepers and ferrymen never charged him. When Robertson lost his hat 
and one boot swimming White river. Governor Harrison freely supplied 
the loss. These little aids largely compensated the preacher for his 
salary. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 285 

In 1816 there came to Indiana a number of Presbyterian 
missionaries sent by the New England societies. As a rule 
these men accepted no regular charges but traveled over the 
State somewhat after the manner of the Methodist preach- 
ers. The most noted of these missionaries were Isaac 
Reedi-' and William W. Martin.-^" Until 1823 the Indiana 
churches belonged to the Louisville Presbytery. By an act 
of the Kentucky synod, October, 1823, most of the Indiana 
churches were organized into the Salem Presbyterj^, which 
held its first meeting April 1, 1824, at Salem.- ^ Within the 
next two years Madison and Wabash Presbyteries were 
added to the list. These, together with the Missouri Pres- 
bytery, were organized into the Indiana Synod, which met 
for the first time October 18, 1823, at Vincennes.-- This 
conference constituted the Presbyterian church in Indiana. 
The meetings for church organization v,^ere as truly State 
conventions as the meeting held at Corydon in 1816. 

The Christian (Disciples) Church had its origin in In- 
diana early in the nineteenth century. It was a result of 
the protest against creeds in the church. It gained its 
membership largely from the Baptist and the Dunkard so- 
cieties, though many Presbyterians and Methodists became 
members. It is impossible in many instances to tell at what 
point a Baptist church became a "New Light" and then a 
Disciple or Christian. 

John Wright, a Baptist of the Blue River, Washington 
county, church, is frequently given as the first Christian 
preacher of the State. He began his work as a "Reformer" 
in 1819. The Dunkards, then quite numerous in south cen- 
tral Indiana, joined the movement in large numbers — fif- 
teen churches joining in a body. The Blue River and Silver 

19 Youth's Book. lu this Mr. Keed details a great many of his ex- 
periences as a missionary in Indiana. 

20 Father of Dr. W. A. P. Martin. President of the Imperial Univer- 
sity of China. 

. 21 William Robinson. John Todd, Samuel T. Scott, William W. Mar- 
tin, John M. Dickey. John F. Crow and Isaac Reed were the members, 
all being present but the first. 

22 Baynard R. Hall, TJie New Purchase, chs. 37, 38. The best treatise 
is Hanford A. Edson, Early Presbyterianism in Indiana. 



286 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Creek Associations of the Baptist church became almost 
entirely "New Light," and then Christian. 

Somewhat later, but independently, what were knov/n 
as the Calvinistic Baptist churches of Rush and Fayette 
counties, under the lead of John T. Thompson, became 
Christian. The Flat Rock Baptist congregation was the 
first to go over. Some of these were called "Reformers" 
and some "New Lights." 

Michael Combs, a "New Light" convert of Wayne coun- 
ty, moved to Montgomery county in 1826 and organized the 
new church in that section. Beginning with 1826, the teach- 
ing of Alexander Campbell reinforced the movement in In- 
diana. The Christian Baptist, the organ of the new 
church, circulated widely in the State. By 1840 the church 
was well organized and prosperous.-" 

Besides the regular work of the church many auxiliary 
societies were organized. At Charlestown, August 2, 1826, 
delegates met and established the Indiana Sabbath School 
Union. Preliminaries for this had been arranged at a 
meeting held in Charlestown in the preceding October. The 
purpose of this was the promotion of Bible study, especially 
among the children. The society established three depots, 
one at Madison, one at New Albany, and one at Indianapo- 
lis, where religious tracts, suitable for use in the Sunday 
schools, could be had. The Indiana Union was a branch of 
the American Sabbath School Union. ^^ 

The American Bible Society, organized in 1816, sent its 
agents into the State to organize auxiliary societies. In 
1826 there were six such societies in Indiana. Their mis- 
sion was to supply Bibles to any one at cost, and to all who 
could not pay, they were given free. On the boards of 

23 A good brief history of the origin of the ('hrisii;in Chnrch in In- 
diana is an article by liev. H. Cl.iy Trn.sty. of Indiannpolis, in the 
Indiana Magazine of IliMonj. VI. 17. For biographie-s of the leading 
pioneer preachers of this sect see M;idison Evjuis. Biographical Sketches 
of the Pioneer I'rcachers of Indiana. 1862: also files of Christian Record. 
1843-1858. 

^'i Indiana Journal, July S, 1826. For an account of the Indianapolis 
Sabbath School Society, established March 29. 182.3. see a four column 
anniversary report by its president Isaac Coe, Indiana Journal, April 
10. 1827. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 287 

these societies were found the most substantial citizens of 
the day. One of their Bibles not infrequently made up the 
library of a pioneer family.-^- In 1832 M. Fairfield, agent 
for Indiana, reported that he had visited forty counties and 
given away about $15,000 worth of Bibles.-'' 

Closely allied with the church was the Indiana Temper- 
ance Society — organized December 9, 1830.-" There were 
twenty-five subordinate societies in the State. Each of 
these sent delegates to the State meeting held at the capital 
every winter while the General Assembly was in session. 
Bethuel F. Morris was its first president. 

In close connection vv^ith the above was the Anti-Gam- 
bling Society, organized at Indianapolis June, 1834, with 
branches in the principal towns of the State. Isaac Coe, 
Superintendent of the Indianapolis Sabbath School, was the 
leader in this movement. Its purpose was to rid the State 
of the professional gamblers. The success of this society 
is a proof that Indiana had passed the pioneer period.-"^ 

The Indiana Colonization Society was organized at In- 
dianapolis November 4, 1829.--* Like its kindred societies, 
it was State wide, composed of small local subordinate so- 
cieties in the various counties. It collected, chiefly through 
the churches, money to pay the expense of sending free 
negroes to Liberia. Mr. Findley, the society's agent, re- 
ported that he had a band of eighty liberated negroes ready 
at the time of the second anniversary meeting to go to 

25 Indiana Journal, Noveaiber 24, 1826 : ibid Misy 12. 1830 

26 Indiana Journal, April 7. 1832. 

27 Indiana Journal, Dec. 3, 1829: Dec. 16, 1829; Jan. 10, 1832. "When 
treated by medical writers and arranged according to its effects on the 
human body, distilled spirits is placed in the same class with hemlock, 
opium and various other poisons." After enumerating the effects of 
liquor as a producer of crime, the report adds: "In all this outline 
of misery the countless woes arising from understandings blinded, con- 
sciences seared, and hearts hardened are not enumerated." First annual 
report, by Secretary J. M. Ray, cashier of the Indiana State Bank. 

■^^ Indiana Journal, June 21, 1834: and Aug. 14, 1835. The society 
furnished evidence to grand juries and legal aid to prosecutors. 

29 Judge Jesse L. Holman presided over this meeting. The other 
members of the State Supreme Court were active members. Indianap- 
olis Gazette, Nov. 12, 1829. 



288 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Liberia. The leading officers of the State were connected 
with this society, which enjoyed a long and worthy career.^*^ 

There was considerable effort put forth during the 
period from 1825 to 1840 toward improved agriculture. 
Centers of this work were Wayne, Washington and Marion 
counties, in each of which a county society was formed. An 
agricultural journal made its appearance also in each 
county. This work was summed up in the law of Febru- 
ary 7, 1835, providing for a county society in each county 
affiliated with the State society."^ County fairs were held, 
at which all the various lines of agricultural produce were 
shown. The greatest good came from the association of 
farmers and the resulting discussion. Farmers' picnics 
were held in the groves, where clever handiwork was in- 
spected or addresses by prominent farmers listened to. By ■ 
this time the early settlers had succeeded in clearing up 
suitable farms and were beginning to enioy a small amount 
of leisure. Their first thoughts were naturally turned 
toward relief from their hard life. As a result many of 
the hardships of pioneer life disappeared.^- 

In the Indianapolis papers, December 8, 1830, appeared 
a card calling for a meeting of all citizens interested in 
forming a State Historical Society.-'^ The society was or- 
ganized December 11, with Judge Benjamin Parke as the 
first president. Its stated purpose was to collect and pre- 
serve the documents of our history and besides to establish 

30 Indiana Sentinel, Jan. 7. 1832. The second annual report by J. M. 
Ray is given. Closely akin to tbis was tlie society organized in Indian- 
apolis during the winter of 1834 for tbe promotion of universal peace. 
A public lecture on tbe evils of war was provided for each winter while 
the legislature was in session. Indiana JonrnaJ, Jan. 1, 1834. 

31 Latcs of Indiana, 1834. 

^2 Indiana Journal, May 15, 1835. The State Board at its iinnual 
meeting, April 28, offered premiums for the best essays on (1) best U'- 
breeds of cattle, (2) horticulture. (3) vine culture. (4) mulberry cul- 
ture, (5) growing of live fences (hedges), (6) vegetable physiology. 

ss Indiana Journal, Dec. 8, 1830. "The members of the General 
Assembly, the members of the Supreme and Circuit Courts, the Rever- 
end Clergy, Gentlemen of the Bar, Physicians and Citizens, generally, 
are requested to meet at the Court House on Saturday evening next 
at 11 o'clock for the purpose of taking into consideration the expe- 
diency of establishing and organizing an Historical Society for the 
State of Indiana." 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 289 

a museum in which the relics might be kept for show.^^ 
The General Assembly later provided that the society should 
be furnished with duplicate copies of all papers and books 
printed by the State. However, no permanent home was 
ever provided and the work so well begun was not kept up. 
The large and priceless collection was loaned and lost until 
at present the society, though still alive, has no library at 
all.35 

§ 56 Education 

Unfortunately the high hopes of the first settlers of 
Indiana for the foundation of a common school system were 
not realized. The constitution directed the General Assem- 
bly to provide for a complete system of schools, "ascending 
in regular gradation from township schools to a State Uni- 
versity."^*^ This ambitious program was destined to re- 
main a dead letter for almost a century. There vv^as no 
system and very few schools in Indiana before the Civil 
War. The constitutional provision remained little more 
than the expression of an ideal. The enabling act of 1816 
gave to the citizens of each congressional township section 
sixteen of the public land. Each section was worth about 
$2 per acre, or $1,280. The gift, unfortunately, was not to 
the State but to the citizens. There was thus entailed on 
the government one of the worst features of a decentralized 
school system. Some sections of school land were valuable, 
others worthless. The principal result of the gift was that 
it continually held out a hope of education to the citizens 
where no realization could follow. 

A law of 1816 permitted the citizens of a congressional 
township to elect three school trustees to administer the 

34 See the (Constitution, Indiana Journal, Dec. 15, 1830. Three judges 
of the Supreme Court and two future governors, Whitcomb and Wallace, 
were on the committee that drew up the Constitution. Dr. Andrew 
Wiley president of the Indiana College, delivered the first annual ad- 
dress Dec. 10, 1831. 

35 The society was incorporated Jan. 10, 1831. In the first 65 pages 
of Vol. I of the Proceedings are the minutes of the society during the 
first 56 years of its existence. These are fragmentary and worthless. 
They show, however, that there has always been alive among our citi- 
zens some appreciation of the Suite's history. 

36 Constitution of Indiana, Art. IX, sec. 2. 



290 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

funds. The law of 1824 incorporated the congressional 
townships, giving the trustees limited power to lease or sell 
school lands. The trustees might also divide the township 
into districts, over each of which they could appoint three 
sub-trustees. These district officers were authorized to lo- 
cate and build houses, determine the length of the term and 
the method of payment of the tuition tax, provided any were 
levied. Books, discipline, course of study, and even meth- 
ods of instruction were left to the district trustees. Malad- 
ministration and neglect are the chief features in the his- 
tory of the schools under this law. 

After 1833 the district trustees were elected by the 
qualified voters of the district. In 1836 any individual 
might hire a teacher and draw his part of the school fund 
for maintenance. There was only one more step that could 
be taken, and this was taken in 1841, when the qualifications 
of the teacher were left to the district trustees. 

It is not strange that under these circumstances the 
teaching profession disappeared. Men of high education 
and of great power filled the ranks of the preachers and 
lawyers, but the teacher of this period was not uncommonly 
the laughing stock of the neighborhood. 

While other institutions of the State were taking on effi- 
cient. State-wide organization, the schools, under the dom- 
ination of the ruinous idea of local self-government, were 
struggling hopelessly with unequal lengths of terms, in- 
capable teachers, dishonest trustees, diversity of text-books, 
lax enforcement of school laws and school discipline, neigh- 
borhood quarrels over school sites, narrow views of educa- 
tion, and lack of wise leadership. This situation lasted 
until the revision of the school law of 1843. The latter date 
perhaps marks the lowest level of general intelligence ever 
reached in the State. The harmful effects of the failure to 
organize were felt in all classes and fields of social life.^^ 

37 The best discussion of this phase of early education is by Dr. W. 
A. Rawles, Centralizing Tendencies in the Administration of Indiana, 
1903. See also R. G. Boone, History of Education in Indiana; Laws of 
Indiana, 1816, 1818, 1827, 1833. 1834, 1840. House Journal. 1839 ; Senate 
Journal, 1825 ; Decumentary Journal, 1841. By 1840 the leading men 
of the State recognized the complete failure of the schools. Governor 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 291 

Despairing of any relief from the public schools, the 
churches had, each in its way, tried to solve the problem of 
popular education. Almost every preacher was a school 
teacher. The Catholics had a large number of fairly good 
schools, at which not only their own, but Protestant children 
received instruction. Hundreds of private subscription 
schools were founded and continued for uncertain periods.' 
Such schools depended so completely on the teacher and 
local conditions that no history of them can be written. 
Any native of the State, past the age of seventy, can de- 
scribe a pioneer school ; no one can describe the pioneer 
schools. 

Higher education fared better in early Indiana than did 
the common schools. A law of 1806 provided for an uni- 
versity at Vincennes. The national government endowed 
the institution with a township of land. A distinguished 
board of trustees did all that was possible to support the 
institution but after a fitful life as college and seminary it 
became dormant and its endowment was taken for the pres- 
ent State University. 

The constitution of 1816 provided that after four years 
the General Assembly should establish a State Seminary. 
In pursuance of this, an act was approved January 20, 
1820, under which a board of trustees organized the State 
Seminary at Bloomington.-'^ The General Assembly, in 

Bigger, iu his message, 1S42. said "Our schools are a mass of statutory 
provisions, presenting difficulties even to the legally discii)lined mind, 
which are almost insuperable to the ordiua.ry citizen." The House Com- 
mittee on Education, 1840, reported : "We present almost the only ex- 
ample of a State professing to have in force a system of common school 
education, which does not know the amount or condition of its school 
funds, the number of schools and scholars to be taught and to receive 
the distribution of those funds. It is a body without a head." House 
Journal, 1840, 393. See also the .Judiciary Report, House Journal, 1840, 
963. 

38 This board consisted of .Judge Charles Dewey, Jonathan IJndley, 
David H. Maxwell. John M. Jenkins, Jonathan Nichols and William 
JjQwe. Indiana Journal. Mar. 15, 1825, contains a notice of the opening 
of the State Seminary at Bloomington. Trustees will open it first Mon- 
day in April. 1825. Rev, Baynard R. Hall is the superintendent and 
faculty. Tuition, $5 per year. Good board can be had for $1.25 per 
week. The institution will be classical and each student must have 
following books: Ross" Latin Grammar; Valpy's Greek Gramtmar; Col- 



292 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

1822, sold the seminary lands in Gibson county, belonging 
to Vincennes University, and turned the proceeds over to 
the new State Seminary. 

In 1828 the State Seminary became Indiana College, 
under a board of fifteen trustees. In 1838 Indiana College 
became Indiana University. Its history for a half century 
is a continuous struggle for money, and students, to keep it 
alive. Its graduating classes before the Civil War rarely 
numbered a dozen and more often fell below a half dozen. 
The torch of learning was kept burning, however, and that 
is more than was done in neighboring States."'" 

The intense religious feeling of the times interfered with 
any united effort in higher education. Hardly had the State 
University been organized when a clerical quarrel began 
over its control. This was most unfortunate for the uni- 
versity. Feeling that they were not fairly represented on 
the board or the faculty of the State University, the Metho- 
dists v/ithdrew their support and by 1840 Indiana Asbury 
University vv^as open for students.^" 

The Baptists, as early as 1834, began an agitation for a 
college under their own control. As a result of this Frank- 
lin College was located in 1835. In its early years it passed 
through much of the same vicissitudes as the other Indiana 
pioneer schools,^ ^ 

The Presbyterians of Salem Presbytery, as early as 
1825, took up the matter of establishing an academy. John 
Finley Crow was then maintaining a boarding school at 
South Hanover. In 1826 the presbytery arranged with Mr. 
Crow to enlarge his school, as soon as possible, into a classi- 

loquics of Gorderiufi ; TeKtniitent : Sclcctiw c ^'el•tel^i: (li-accd Minora; 
Selectae e i'rofanis; Caesar; VirijU. Must linve no ponies. Trustees, 
Joshua O. Howe. S.unuel Dodds. John Ketcham. William Lowe, Jona- 
than Nichols, D. H. Maxwell. Cf. Baynard R. Hall, TJie New Purchase. 

39 T. A. Wylie. Indiana University, 1890; Indiana Alumni Quarterly, 
I. 

40 F. C. HoUiday. Indiana Methodism, 317. The Methodists estab- 
lished the New Albany Seminary in 1837 ; Whitewater College, at Cen- 
terville; Fort Wayne College, 1846; Brookville College, 1851; Moore's 
Hill College, 1853.' 

41 William T. Stott. Indiana Baptist Ilistori/. 346; see also a His- 
tory of Franlcliri College. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 293 

cal school where boys and young men might prepare for 
college, and thus for the ministry. This school was formal- 
ly opened in a log house January 1, 1827. The usual strug- 
gle followed. Like its predecessor at Bloomington, about all 
that can be said of it during the next quarter of a century 
is that it survived.^- 

The Catholics were the earliest and also the latest to 
found denominational colleges in this period. The institu- 
tions at Vincennes date back to the early years of the State's 
history but none of them ever gave promise of becoming a 
first class college or university. Father Sorin, a member 
of the Congregation of the Holy Cross of Mans, France, 
understock to supply the needs of the northwestern Catho- 
lics in this respect. He reported to Bishop Hailandiere, of 
Vincennes, as a missionary in 1841. His first work was at 
St. Peters, a small missionary station in Daviess county. 
Here the college would have been located had it not been 
for the college at Vincennes. At the suggestion of Hailan- 
diere, the little band from Daviess county repaired to the 
present site of Notre Dame du Lac, on the banks of the St. 
Joseph, and there, in the winter of 1842 and 1843, was 
founded the present college.'*^ 

There is no intention here of attempting a history of any 
of these colleges. The purpose is to illustrate the effort of 
the pioneers of Indiana to solve the problem of education 
after the State had failed. Had the State University been 
properly supported, and had it freed itself from the re- 
proach of sectarianism earlier, it is conceivable that it 
might have gathered together all these factors and welded 
them into a large and prosperous school. More probably 
the day of the great State university had not yet come. 

Between these extremes, the college and the common 
school, there was no direct connection. Effort was made, 
however, both by public and private means, to bridge over 
this gap in the imaginary school system of Indiana. Be- 

42 Hanford A. Edson, Early Indiana Preshyterianism, 22S: see iilso 
History of Hanover College. 

43 A Brief History of the University of Notre Dame du Lac, 1895. 

(20) 



294 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ginning with the constitution itself ^^^ which provided for a 
system of intermediate schools, and extending through a 
series of statutes down till 1840, the State tried to estab- 
lish seminaries in each county. Besides the general laws, 
which authorized any county under certain conditions to 
establish a seminary, thirty-two special laws incorporated 
as many county seminaries between 1825 and 1843. Two 
sources of revenue were provided. All fines for breaches 
of the penal laws went to the seminary fund. The other 
source was private donations. Under the general law of 
1831 no county could establish a seminary until it had a 
fund of $400. 

There was no uniformity in the management, course of 
study, length of term, method of instruction, text books, or 
any other material consideration connected with these sem- 
inaries. Like the common schools, while most of the sem- 
inaries were of no value, some rendered long and meritor- 
ious service to the community. Lack of friends, dishonest 
trustees and factional quarrels make up the burden of their 
history. ^-"^ 

The practice of medicine was considered a fit subject for 
legislation by the First General Assembly of the State. The 
circuit court districts were made medical districts, in each 
of which a board of censors was named. This board had 
power to examine and license any prospective physician it 
deemed well enough skilled to undertake the active practice. 
The usual way of preparing for these examinations was by 
"reading" medicine with some doctor, preferably a member 
of the board of censors, for a number of years. Persons 
refused a license were not thereby refused the right to prac- 
tice but such persons were unable to collect their fees by 
law. Each board had to report annually to the president of 
the State Senate. 

A significant provision of this law forbade any physi- 
cian charging a patient more than twelve and one-half cents 

44 Constitution of 1816, Art. X. sec. 3. 

45 A seminiiry paper by Walter .Jaclison Walvetielcl is the best stncly 
that has been made of these schools. 



RELIGION AND EDUCATION 295 

per mile for the distance necessarily traveled. This fee 
might be doubled if the trip were made at night.*^ 

The General Assembly of 1825 revised the law concern- 
ing medical societies, establishing the State Medical Society, 
composed of delegates from each district society. The dis- 
trict censors still retained the right to license candidates, 
but if a candidate were refused he had the privilege of ap- 
pealing to the State society. The latter body was also di- 
rected to establish a "Uniform system of the course and 
time of medical study, and the qualifications necessary for 
license."^' In its general features this law remained until 
1843, when it was omitted from the Revision of that year.^^ 

46 Laws of Indiana, 1816, 161. 
4T Laws of Indiana, 1825, 40. 

48 W. A. Rawles, Centralizing Tendencies in the Administration of 
Indiana, 234. 



CHAPTER XIII 

politics from 1825 to 1840 

§ 57 The Jacksonian Party 

From the beginning of the territorial government, in 
1800, there had been more or less political rivalry between 
the eastern and western settlers. It was first noticeable be- 
tween the settlers of Vincennes and those of Clark's Grant. 
Later it appeared between the settlers of the Whitewater 
Valley and those of the Wabash. With the adoption of the 
constitution in 1816 this rivalry began to disappear. A part 
of that hostility had been due to the belief by the eastern 
settlers that the territorial officers at Vincennes had too 
much authority. After Jonathan Jennings, of Clark coun- 
ty, became governor, William Hendricks, of Jefferson, con- 
gressman, and James Noble, of Franklin, senator, a similar 
complaint was heard from Vincennes. It was charged that 
everything was decided by a caucus of office holders at 
Corydon or Indianapolis. 

By 1824 the old Congressional Caucus at Washington 
was regarded with suspicion by the western democrats. The 
methods of Governor Jennings and his followers were said 
to be very much like those at Washington. ^ 

It was customary at this time for a number of leading 
members of the General Assembly, together with the gov- 
ernor and a few other State officers, to meet about the close 
of the annual legislative session and lay their political plans 
for the coming year. At a meeting of this kind Adams 
presidential electors had been chosen early in the year 1824. 
The electors were the three judges of the supreme court, 
the ex-lieutenant governor, and the Speaker of the House 

1 Western Sim, Mar. 29. 1S17. 



POLITICS 297 

of Representatives, all members of the officeholding aris- 
tocracy, as was charged at the time. 

Along with the opposition to the caucus the question of 
the relation of a representative to his constituents was 
widely discussed. The same party that opposed the cau- 
cus demanded that the representatives either in Congress or 
the General Assembly should vote as his constituents wished 
him to, and not as he thought individually. If unable to 
carry out the will of his supporters, the representatives 
should resign. This was called the "right of instruction."^ 

Another source of political unrest was the growing be- 
lief among the farmers that a class of professional office- 
holders was in charge of the State government. There was 
considerable ground for the charge. The men who made 
the constitution administered it until about 1829, when the 
Jacksonian Revolution turned them out.^ 

The same class of farmers that opposed the office-hold- 
ers in the caucus opposed the banks. The failure of the 
First State Bank strengthened this party materially. Those 
farmers and merchants able to load a flatboat for the down 
river trade were now frequently called the traders. In their 

2 111 Nov., 1820. Enoch D. John and Joseph Hann.i. members elect 
from Franklin county to the General Assembly, sent out a hand bill 
calling their constituents into convention for the purpose of framing 
instructions to guide their course in the Assembly soon to meet. The 
editor of the Vincennes Centincl, a government organ, remarked editor- 
ially : "We do not think highly of this mode of legislation. If members 
are not fit for their station all the wit of their constituents cannot make 
them so, in so short a time. "We might as well send our instructions 
on pack horses." 

3 Western Sun, March 29, 1S17. Sixteen out of the forty-two mem- 
bers of the constitutional convention returned to the first session of the 
legislature. At least six more immediately accepted some office under 
the constitution. All told, the members sat for a total of 154 tei-ms, 
making an average, not counting those in administrative offices, of about 
four years' service in the General Assembly for each member. Consid- 
ering 36, the number of members of the first session, to have remained 
the size of the Assembly, there would have been an average attendance 
by the members of the convention of seventeen members, almost a ma- 
jority. Add to these the terms served by the members as governors, con- 
gressmen, senators, judges, and in the national service and one begins 
to realize that the offices were fairly monoix)lized by a small group of 
politicians. It is clearly not too much to say that they ruled the State 
during the period of 1816 to 1824. 



298 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

homes there were some evidences of luxury brought from 
New Orleans. The poorer class of farmers were often called 
"yeomanry," a term they disliked at first, but one they be- 
came proud of under Jackson. 

The followers of Jackson were handicapped by lack of 
leaders, and means to carry on a campagin. Scarcely a 
member of the party held office. 

The election of John Q. Adams by the House of Repre- 
sentatives welded the dissatisfied democrats of Indiana into 
the Jacksonian Democratic Party. There was a fierceness 
in their resentment of the treatment of Jackson which was 
little short of warlike. They referred to the election of 
Adams as "the theft of the presidency." All believed that 
Clay had sold his influence to Adams for the appointment 
as Secretary of State, a bargain and sale of the government 
which they thought far more dangerous than Burr's Con- 
spiracy.^ 

As soon as the election of Adams was known in Indiana 
a real political party began to take form. At log-rollings, 
boat-loadings, and above all on muster days the agitation 
was kept up. Viewed in all lights and from any angle, Jack- 
son appeared to them their natural leader. He was a west- 
ern man, a pioneer democrat. Unlike Clay, he had refused 
to affiliate with the aristocratic congressmen from the east. 
The Indians were the greatest menace to the pioneer. He 
had driven them beyond the Mississippi. The English were 
the only national enemy. At New Orleans he had defeated 
their finest army, with the untrained battalions of pioneer 
militia. In all his successes he had preserved his sincerity 
and his modesty. In this he was held up as a contrast to 
Clay, the modern Esau. The Democratic campaign was 
pitched on a high plane. The nation was in danger of mon- 
archy, the west was entitled to a share in the government, 
the common man must assert his rights and, most important 
of all, Jackson must be vindicated. These were the planks 
of the platform. 

Like skillful soldiers, the Jacksonians began the battle 
by attacking and taking the outposts of the enemy, the 

4 Western Sun, April 2. 1825. 



POLITICS 299 

township, county and militia offices. These were largely in 
the hands of the Jacksonians by 1828. By that time also a 
county and tow^nship political organization had been com.- 
pleted. Seeing the drift of public opinion, one newspaper 
after another became Jacksonian.-^ 

Jackson had been nominated by the legislature of Ten- 
nessee in 1825 ; so that it was not necessary to hold a State 
convention in Indiana except to nominate electors. This 
convention, the second in the history of the State, was held 
at Indianapolis January 8, 1828.*' Regularly chosen dele- 
gates, thirty-seven in number, representing twenty coun- 
ties, were present. Nine members of the General Assem- 
bly, for counties not otherwise represented, were also made 
members. 

The significant thing about this convention was the po- 
litical organization it perfected. Beginning with the town- 
ship, it provided that the lister (our assessor) of property, 
when he made his annual visit in the spring, should note 
the political preference of each voter. This poll book was 
then turned over to the Vigilance Committee (our precinct 
committeemen), who reported the voters to the County 
Committee of Correspondence. The Committee of Vigilance 
divided the voters of the township into groups, and mem- 
bers of the committee visited each voter personally. The 
Vigilance Committee also raised funds, furnished tickets to 
the voters on election day, arranged for stump speakings, 
and on election day attended the polls. The Committee of 
Correspondence resembled our county Central Committee 
and looked after county politics. It also communicated with 
the Committee of General Superintendence, our State Cen- 
tral Committee." This convention adopted a platform fa- 

5 Western Sun, Feb. 17. 1827. "TUe friends of General Jackson will 
be pleased to note that the cause is gaining strength in the State. With- 
in a few days the PaUadhim (Lawrenceburg). the Guest (of Vevay) and 
the Annotator (Salem) have come out for him. 

^Western Sun, Jan. 26. 1828: Indiana Journal Jan. 9, 1828. 

"• Indiana State Journal, Jan. 9, 1828. The State Committee consisted 
of R. C. Newland, Eli W. Malott. John McMahan. Henry S. Handy, all 
of Washington county: Gen. John Carr, of Clark: William Hoggatt, of 
Orange; William Marshall, of Jackson: A. S, Burnett, of Floyd; John 
Milroy, of Lawrence; Nelson Lodge, of Jefferson; Elihu Stout, of Knox; 



300 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

voring democracy as against Federalism, the American sys- 
tem of government as against the English, and the respon- 
sibility of public offices to the people. With this platform 
and this organization the Jacksonian party entered the 
campaign of 1828 to vindicate Jackson and reclaim the lib- 
erties to the people. 

It was this superb party organization that enabled the 
Jacksonian Democrats to carry nearly all the presidential 
elections in Indiana, though the State, on national issues 
was opposed to them. 

Opposed to the Jacksonians were the Adams and Clay 
men, who called themselves National or Jeffersonian Repub- 
licans. This party contained nearly all the experienced pol- 
iticians of the State, though it must be kept in mind that 
political lines were not so clear and strong as at present. 
Senator John Tipton was an influential politician of this 
period though it could hardly be said he belonged to either 
party. The same was true of Governors Jennings and 
Noble. 

The Adams, or Administration, men held their State 
convention at Indianapolis, January 12, 1828.'^ Of the fifty- 
seven delegates present all seem to have been office-holders 
and most of them were members of the General Assembly 
then in session. Forty-one of the fifty-six counties of the 
State v/ere represented. In looking over the list of dele- 
gates it would seem that all the leading men of the State 
belonged to this party. Such was the fact. State officers 
and men of State reputation belonged to this party, while 
county and township officers belonged to the other. 

The organization of the Clay-Adams Party was never 
close and complete like that of its opponent. It depended 
for success on the dignity of its members, the appeal of its 
platform, and the oratory of its stump speakers. In these 
latter two points it surpassed the Jacksonians. It was the 
champion of the tariff, internal improvements, and the 

William C. Keen, of Switzerland; Jacob B. I.owe. of Monroe: Da\id 
V. Culley. of Dearborn; Thomas Posey, of Harrison. At least six of 
these were editors. 

8 Indiana Journal, Jan. 31, 1S28. 



POLITICS 



301 



All the northern part of the state 
still owned ty Indians 



Wabash 



Reservation 




Randolph 




CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICTS 
established by the aat 

Of January 3, 1822 



Indiana in 1822. By B. V. Shockley. 



/ 



302 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bank, all of which were favored issues among the early In- 
diana voters. The stump speakers of this party were elo- 
quent, and could hold their "large and respectable aud- 
iences" for three or four hours at a time discussing the is- 
sues. 

These parties have been described in some detail for the 
reason that they continued without change to divide the 
voters of Indiana down until the slavery issue broke them 
up. The Jackson men stood for a wider democracy, a more 
universal participation in the government bj^ the common 
people. They demanded a firmer control over their law- 
makers, a government more responsive to public opinion. 
They insisted on instructing their representatives and re- 
quired them to resign or carry out the instructions. They 
insisted on the government keeping out of business so far 
as possible, and not interfering with the affairs of the citi- 
zens. 

The Adams men believed in a representative govern- 
ment, in which the representative was left to his own in- 
dividual opinion as the guide to his political conduct. It 
was the duty of the voters to elect superior men to office 
and it was the duty of the latter to govern with justice and 
foresight. The clashings of these two sets of opinions, 
varied with endless personalities, made up the warp and 
woof of Indiana politics before the Civil War. 

Under the old constitution the State elections fvvero 
held on the first Monday in August. The governor served a 
term of three years, so that 1828 was the first time since 
1816, when there was a State and national election the same 
year. Governor Ray, who had been elected in 1825 on an 
internal improvement platform, was a candidate for re- 
election. '^ In the organization of parties he had refused to 
take sides. He believed national politics should have no 
place in a State election. On this platform he had been 

!*J;inies Brown Ray was born in Jefferson county, Kentucky, Feb. 
19, 1794. He studied law at Cincinnati and settled down to practice at 
Brookville. He had served one term in the house and two terms in the 
senate. He was a firm believer in the railroad and his favorite vision 
was Indianapolis with railroads radiating from it like spokes from a 
hub. He died of cholera at Cincinnati in 1848. 



POLITICS 303 

elected in 1825 over Judge Isaac Blackford. He attempted 
to repeat the same tactics in 1828, but party lines were 
more closely drawn and it was decided by both parties to 
nominate opposing partisan candidates. This movement 
alarmed Governor Ray so much that he made a private 
agreement with the Jackson men that as soon as the elec- 
tion was over he would come out frankly for Jackson, stat- 
ing publicly that Jackson's letter in answer to an inquiry 
by the General Assembly had assured him that the Jackson 
men were all right on the tariff and internal improve- 
ments, i*^* 

Everything seemed to be sailing on smooth seas until 
the governor, in a speech at Brookville, where his neighbors 
were nearly all Adams men, severely denounced the Jackson 
men as a faction not fit to be entrusted with power. This 
was reported to the State chairman, Henry S. Handy, of 
Salem, who laid the whole agreement before the Jackson 
committee. The Jackson men promptly disavowed the gov- 
ernor and nominated Dr. I. T. Canby, of Madison, for gov- 
ernor. The newspapers ridiculed the governor, making his 
position almost unbearable. ^^ The election was so near at 
hand, however, that only a comparatively few voters learned 
of the double dealing, and the governor was re-elected by 
a substantial plurality over Dr. Canby and Harbin Moore, 
the Adams candidate.^- In the following presidential elec- 
tion, November, 1828, Jackson carried the State by a heavy 
majority. 

As soon as Jackson was inaugurated a reign of terror 
began among Indiana politicians such as has never been ex- 
perienced before or since. The execution of ofRce-holders 
began with the postmasters. It is doubtful if a single 

^0 Indiana Journal, April 3. 182S. This issue of the paper has a 
copy of the joint resolution. Ray's four column letter to Jackson, and 
Jackson's answer. Also the famous Coleman letter of Jackson on the 
tariff. 

11 Indiana Journal, July 10 and July 17, 1828, contains all the ma- 
terials on this matter; see Western Sun. July 19, 1828: Indiana Palla- 
dium, July 19, 1828. 

12 The vote was: Ray, 15.141: Canby, 12.305: Moore. 10.904. In- 
diana Palladium, Dec. 13. 1828. 



304 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Adams man was left in a single office in Indiana. The 
United States marshals, district attorneys, registers and 
receivers of land offices, superintendents and bosses on the 
National Road, Indian agents, revenue collectors, and post- 
masters were all removed. Some of the postmasters re- 
ceived less than $5 per year, but they had to stand aside 
nevertheless. Every Jackson man appointed had been ac- 
tive in the campaign, so that the Jacksonian political or- 
ganization was composed for the next twenty years of the 
federal office-holders of the State. 

The people in general rather feared the result of the 
wholesale change, but it seems that the new officers were at 
least as capable as the old, and far more courteous. The ex- 
perience confirmed the Jacksonian pioneers in their opinion 
that office holding was not a business that required either 
extraordinary talents or blue blood. ^^ 

§ 58 The Internal Improvements Party 

In local politics the Internal Improvements Party con- 
trolled the State by an overv/nelming majority. This party 
was not unevenly divided between the Jackson and Adams 
men. Two of its most prominent leaders were Samuel 
Judah of Vincennes, who wrote the Jackson platforms in 
1824 and in 1828, and Noah Noble, the successful candidate 
for governor in 1831 and in 1834. It was charged that 
he had voted for Jackson. National politics, at least, 
did not control State elections as at present. In or- 
ganizing the General Assembly in 1829 J. F. D. Lanier, 
later the distinguished Whig banker of Madison, was made 
principal clerk unanimously, while Edward A. Hannegan, 
later the eloquent Democratic senator, was chosen enroll- 
ing clerk. 1^ 

The campaign for the governorship in 1831 was between 
Noah Noble and James G. Read, the former being success- 
ful by 2,791 majority.i^ Very little interest was taken in 

13 Western Sun, May 30, June 16. June 20. July 11. Aug. 29, Sept. 12, 
Sept. 26, 1828, and the Indiana Journal, April 14. 1830, give long lists. 

14 Indiana Journal. Dec. 8, 1829. 

15 Noah Noble was a Virginian by birth, having been born in Clark 



POLITICS 305 

the campaign. The vote shows little significance beyond 
tlie personal popularity of the two men. Both were Inter- 
nal Improvement men and both had supported Jackson, 
though Noble later became a Whig. The congressional cam- 
paign of this year showed the superiority of the Jacksonian 
organization over that of the Clay supporters. The former 
elected all three congressmen, though in two of the districts 
they were in a decided minority. They held regular con- 
ventions and nominated a single candidate, while in the 
Second District the Clay men had six candidates. Gen. 
John Carr, the Jacksonian candidate, was elected by 4,855 
votes out of a total of 14,818 in the district. In the Third 
District Jonathan McCarty was elected by 6,243 votes out 
of a total vote of 14,639.i6 

As soon as the campaign for the governorship was over 
the Jackson men, now calling themselves National Demo- 
crats, began active preparation for the approaching contest 
between Jackson and Clay. The defeat of Mr. Read alarmed 
them for their supremacy. They could not tell what effect 
the removals from office would have ; neither could they tell 
what influence the Second United States Bank would have 
with its fabulous wealth. The campaign would also have 
to be made against Henry Clay, a western man, and a most 
skillful politician, not to mention his power as a stump 
speaker. 

County conventions began in November and a State con- 
vention was called for December. The Clay men, under 
the name of National Republicans, and claiming to be the 
party of Jefferson, began their organization as soon as they 
learned the Democrats were at work. A series of county 
conventions, or mass meetings, was followed in each party 

county, Virginia, Jan. 15, 1794. While quite small, his parents eanie to 
Kentucky, crossing over to Indiana and settling at Brookville in 1816. 
His older brother was United States senator and his younger brother 
receiver of public moneys at the Brookville land office till 1826. While 
.moving the land office to Indianapolis that year his brother. Lazarus, 
died, and Noah succeeded him in the office. He had formerly been sheriff 
two terms and had served in the General Assembly. He held office al- 
most all his life. He died at his home in Indianapolis in 1844. He was 
a Whig, though not much of a partisan. 
16 Madison RepuUican. Oct. 13, 1831. 



306 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

by a State meeting in Indianapolis.^" The Whigs met 
in the Methodist church, forty-six delegates being present 
from twenty-nine counties. Delegates to the Baltimore 
Convention were chosen and a corresponding committee of 
one from each county selected. The Democrats met in the 
courthouse December 12. They adopted resolutions, pre- 
pared an address, endorsed Jackson, and nominated an elec- 
toral ticket. 

A third party appeared in the field in this campaign. 
Some time in November the Anti-Masons held a convention 
at Hanover and decided to take an active part in the ap- 
proaching election. Several newspapers were advocates of 
their cause and the leaders of the old parties were seri- 
ously concerned. The convention appointed a committee to 
ascertain the views of the candidates for the presidency. 
The committee addressed Clay on the subject and his an- 
swer had much to do with allaying the agitation. He 
pointed out to them that Masonry was strictly a non-po- 
litical organization like a church or school, and it would not 
be good practice on the part of candidates to drag such 
questions into politics. The movement in Indiana subsided 
as rapidly as it had arisen, though for several years the 
Masonic order was regarded with suspicion by the public in 
general. IS 

The national election of 1832 was a well-conducted con- 
test. The Jacksonian Democratic Party was thrown largely 
on the defensive. The two candidates, Clay and Jackson, 
appealed to the western pioneers. Clay had much the 
stronger platform and Jackson had much the better organi- 
zation. The Whigs held a State meeting or convention at 
Indianapolis, January 31, principally for the purpose of 
strengthening and perfecting their organization.^^ The 
weakness of their organization was that all the federal 

17 Indiana Democrat, Sept. IT. 1831 : Nov. 5. 1831 ; Nov. 23. 1831. In- 
diana Journal, Nov. 5. 1831 : Nov. 12. 1831 : Dec. 14, 1831. 

i^s Indiana Journal, Dec. 3. 1831: ISIiles' Register 41: 2G0. The party 
had an electoral ticket in the field, but no returns available give any 
votes cast for it. The electoral ticket is given in the Vevay Messenger, 
Nov. 3, 1832. 

"i^^ Indiana Journal. Feb. 1. 1832. 



POLITICS 307 

office holders were Democrats and thus had more time and 
better opportunity to meet the voters and talk politics. The 
Whig politician had to go and see the voters, while the 
voters had to go and see the Democratic politicians. 

The veto of the new charter for the United States Bank 
upset all party plans in the State. It was knovv^i in the 
west that Jackson was not an enthusiastic friend of the 
bank, but it was not expected that he would try to kill it. 
The newspapers and politicians of the State were at a loss 
to understand the President's motives. Some thought it 
was the result of an understanding between Jackson and 
the wealthy money lenders of the east whereby Jackson 
had agreed to put all paper money out of circulation so 
that the wealthy who held all the specie could loan it at a 
much higher rate of interest.-" Others were confident that 
it was a battle royal between the government and the 
greedy monopolists. The Democrats adroitly shifted the at- 
tack from the bank to "Nick Biddle," whose name was made 
a synonym for greed, usury, and high-handed spoliation. 
The smouldering hatred of the old Indiana note-shaving 
banks was also kindled to a blaze. On the whole, Indiana 
sustained Jackson's veto of the bank charter, though prac- 
tically all its public men opposed it. 

There was another veto, however, which could not be 
explained. A bill had been prepared and passed by Con- 
gress for opening the Wabash. The President had signed 
similar bills applying to the Tennessee river and to a river 
in Pennsylvania. The Indiana measure died in his pocket. -^ 
While this did not seem to affect the election of 1832, it 
did materially affect that of 1836. President Jackson's ob- 
jection to the expenditure of public money on the Wabash 
was that the stream was not sufficient for general naviga- 
tion and that there was no port of entry on the river. In 
the next session Senator John Tipton presented another 
bill for the improvement of the Wabash, including in the 
bill a provision making Lafayette a port of entry. Tipton 

20 Indiana RepuMican, Sept. 20, 1832, quoting the Wuhash Courier. 
The Wahash Herald asserted the Democratic view. 

21 Indiana Journal, Sept. 8, 1832; also Vincennes Gazette, Aug. 2, 1834. 



308 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

cited thirty cases in which Jackson had signed similar 
measures. But it was all useless. The President vetoed 
it and thereby lost the support of his friends in the Wa- 
bash Valley, and perhaps thereby lost the State to Van 
Buren in 1836.-- 

Just before the election, October, 1832, a committee of 
prominent Whigs drew up a statement called "Facts for 
the people." It set forth in a masterly way the national 
issues, and the Whig arguments. In this respect it was 
the forerunner of the modern campaign text-book. The 
vote, however, showed that Jackson still retained the sup- 
port of the Indiana voters. Clay carried two of the seven 
congressional districts, and nineteen out of the sixty-six 
counties. Jackson's majority was 6,077. Fountain, Knox, 
Vigo, Tippecanoe, and Cass counties showed by their vote 
their resentment of the Wabash veto.^^ Samuel Judah, 
United States attorney, and Samuel Milroy, receiver at 
Crawfordsville, criticised Jackson and both lost their offices 
in 1833. Dr. Canby also lost his position in the land office 
at Crawfordsville. Judge Jeremiah Sullivan likewise bolted 
on the bank veto. Wayne county gave Clay a majority of 
969, the largest county majority in the State. Jackson's 
heaviest vote came from the triangle between Indianapolis, 
Madison, and Evansville.-^ This was, and still is, a center 
of Jacksonian Democracy in Indiana. 

One of the sharpest political struggles that had taken 
place in the State up to the time took place in the General 
Assembly of 1832. The veto of the bill rechartering the 
Second Bank of the United States made it imperative that 
some form of currency be provided for the citizens of In- 
diana. Several plans v/ere submitted and many committee 
reports made. Finally three plans were v/orked out and 
embodied in bills. The General Assembly, however, was 

22 Logan Esarey. Internal Improi-ements in Earlii Indiana, 77. 

-^Indiana Journal. Oct. .3. 1832. For Ti])ton's quarrel with Jackson 
see .V//C.S' Rcpi.sfcr, 46-443. 

24 Election reports may be found in the St. Joseph Beacon, Dec. 15, 
1832 ; Lawrenceburg Palladium, Dee. 8, 1832 ; Vevay Messenger, Dec. 15. 
These have been compared with the official returns and found con-ect. 



POLITICS 309 

unable to agree on which one was best. Both parties de- 
manded action. Several members resigned rather than 
vote on these bills. -"^ 

The General Assembly elected in August, 1833, showed 
the effects of the failure of the previous Assembly to act. 

Twelve new senators took their seats. It was claimed 
that only one senator was re-elected. In the House not 
less than twenty-five new faces appeared. The old leaders 
who had dominated the General Assembly since 1816 dis- 
appeared. The pioneer period of Indiana history was 
ended, so far as the State legislature was concerned. 

The congressional elections in 1833 again showed the 
superior organization of the Democratic Party. Ratliff 
Boone, of the First District, was opposed by four Whigs 
and one Anti-Mason candidate. The latter. Dr. D. G. 
Mitchell, of Corydon, polled 287 votes out of a total of 
7,805 in the district.-^ 

The year 1834 brought with it a renewal of the contest 
between Governor Noble and James G. Read for the gov- 
ernorship. The latter was nominated by a poorly attended 
convention at Indianapolis. The charge was made that it 
was attended merely by officeholders. Twenty-three out 
of the sixty-three counties were not represented at all. The 
Whigs referred to it as a caucus."-" 

By this time the State was deeply interested in internal 
improvement schemes, had chartered a State Bank, and 
was looking forward with great ambitions. Governor 
Noble was the soul of all these policies. He was not a par- 
tisan. The Whig Indiana Journal called him a Jacksonian 
Democrat. He appointed Nathan B. Palmer, one of the 
leaders of the Democrats, to the office of Treasurer of 

2o Jndiann Democrat, Feb. !). 1833. Calvin Fletcher, then a senator 
from Marion county, resigned. The Democrat approved of his resigna- 
tion if he could not vote as his constituents desired: "In this land of 
Republican principles the right of instruction is generally conceded as 
ane of the reserved rights of the people, and that man who openly de- 
nies that right will seldom be honored with their confidence." This was 
sound Jacksonian Democracy. 

-^Indiana Palladium, Aug. 31, 18.33. 

-'^Indiana Journal, ,T;in. 4 and .Jan. 11, 1834. 

(21) 



310 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

State.- ^ By sldllful political management he had built up 
a bipartisan organization, the leading members of which 
were the promoters of the State Bank and the internal im- 
provements. This organization controlled State politics for 
ten or twelve years, until the failure of the internal im- 
provements brought the leaders into disfavor. Mr. Read 
also claimed to be non-partisan.-'-' In this role of non-parti- 
sanship Noble had all the advantage for Read had been an 
outspoken and unsparing Jackson man. 

Early in the campaign Read and Noble signed a pledge 
not to do any canvassing. They had opposed each other in 
a canvass of the State three years before, both had been 
in public life for many years, and it was thought a waste of 
time and money to canvass the State."" The agreement, 
however, was largely in favor of the governor, since he was 
meeting voters from all parts of the State every day. In 
spite of this promise. Read made a canvass, but the result 
was evident from the beginning. -^^ The national elections 
everywhere were a severe rebuke to Jackson. The Whig 
papers are full of bitter attacks on Jackson's veto, specie 
circular, pet banks, the betrayal of the tariff, and the war 
on the United States Bank. 

Read carried sixteen out of the seventy counties voting. 
These were in the Jacksonian triangle, with Carroll and 
Parke added. He was defeated in the State by a vote of 
27,302 to 36,925.''^- He lost five out of seven congressional 

28 Indiana Journal, Feb. 22, 1834. 

-^Indiana Journal, April 19, 1<S34. See also extract from Salem An- 
notdtor. The Paoli Patriot also made the same claim for Kead. On the 
other hand, the Indiana Democrat, June 27. charges that all Clay papei'S 
were supporting Noble. The Madison /\'( jnihlican. July 3. denied this; 
but it was substantially true. 

'•i^ Indiana Journal, April 26. IKU. 

•51 "Judge Read started from Jeflersonville July !), and has been busily 
engaged traveling and making speeches ever since. He will have tra- 
versed the whole Wabash country as high ui) as Lafayette by the day 
of the election. We have learned from most of the counties he has vis- 
ited that Noble's friends are deserting him like winter leaven iind ral- 
lying under the banner of Democratic Kepublicanism with Keiul." In- 
diana Democrat, quoted by Journal. Aug. 9, 1834. 

32 Logansport Telegraph, Se])t. 0. 18.34. The results of ^be 1831 and 
1834 elections are given in ))arallel colnnms. 



POLITICS 311 

districts. The sweeping majority was a ratification of the 
internal improvement policy by the voters. The spell of 
General Jackson had spent its force and the voters gave 
their attention principally to State affairs. 

After the election of 1834 it seemed that Indiana was 
safely Whig. The State officers and a large majority of the 
members of the General Assembly belonged to that party, 
while the regular Democratic organization was almost 
broken up. Tipton, Hannegan, Sullivan, Judah, Milroy, 
Drake, and Dr. Canby had either quit the party or were 
temporarily opposing it. 

The Whigs, however, failed to form any political or- 
ganization and allowed the fruits of the victory to escape 
them. The congressional election of 1835 returned seven 
Democratic congressmen from the seven districts. Three, 
and perhaps four, of these had supported Noble. In the 
Sixth District no Whig candidate appeared. There was no 
political principle at stake in the campaign. It seems there 
was not even a political organization formed. 

§ 59 The Harrison Campaigns 

The political campaign that began in Indiana in 1835 
and ended in November, 1840, was the most picturesque 
ever waged in the State. During the five years, 1835-1840, 
there was no let-up in the struggle. 

The campaign began about the middle of the year 1835. 
Harrison does not now seem to have been even a remote 
possibility as a presidential candidate at the beginning of 
the agitation. Col. R. M. Johnston had long been one of 
the dashing figures in American political life. Soon after 
the close of the War of 1812 it had been claimed that the 
mounted Kentuckians, at the battle of the Thames, had 
stampeded the Indians; a short time later it was said the 
fiery Colonel Johnston had led the charge; a short time 
later, in the press accounts, it was the dashing Colonel 
Johnston who had killed Tecumseh; still later it was the 
fashion to call him the renowned Colonel Johnston who 
commanded the Kentuckians at the battle of the Thames. 



312 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Now at last it had become the glorious General Richard M. 
Johnston who won the battle of the Thames. 

Johnston was a receptive candidate for the presidency 
to succeed Jackson, whose political methods he imitated. 
He had perhaps no thought of waking any resentment in 
the heart of the old general at North Bend. And perhaps 
no such thing would have resulted but for an unfortunate 
expression by citizens of Indianapolis. A committee, com- 
posed of Arthur St. Clair, Seton W. Norris, Livingston Dun- 
lap, James Morrison, Henry Brady, and Alex Wylie, was 
appointed to invite General Harrison to come to their town 
and celebrate the anniversary of the victory he had helped 
to win.33 The note, as printed, appears innocent enough, 
yet a combination of circumstances made of it the spark 
that fired the magazine. 

Harrison's answer, dated September 27, 1835, filled two 
columns, and was copied by almost every paper in the 
northwest. It showed beyond doubt that the old pioneer 
had all his ancient power. Like his camps among the In- 
dians, his letter had no points left unguarded where an 
attack could be made. The Indiana Democrat, edited at 
the time by Alexander F. Morrison, had mentioned the 
meeting at Indianapolis as preliminary to the celebration 
of the victory of the Thames, achieved by General Har- 
rison and Colonel Johnston. A Kentucky poem had re- 
cently gone the rounds of the press, which celebrated the 
battle and likened Johnston to Telamonian Ajax as he had 
ranged the field of battle. Governor Shelby was humbly 
mentioned as Agamemnon, but nothing was said of Har- 
rison. A great meeting was called by the Tammany So- 
ciety of New York that year to celebrate the victory won 
by Colonel Johnston on the Thames. In Boston they called 
attention to the victory of the Thames won by Colonels 
Johnston and Harrison. Why, asked the old general, should 
his own name be linked with that of Johnston in connec- 
tion with the action on the Thames? He, himself, was in 
supreme and unquestioned command. Not a movement 

33 Madison Republican and Banner. Oct. 15. 1835. 



POLITICS 313 

was made but by his order. Why should this colonel of 
militia be his associate? No one denied the gallantry of 
any part of the army, none certainly would detract from 
the merits of Colonel Johnston. But no one ever spoke of 
the victory won by General Jackson and some colonel at 
New Orleans, although he had a number of able officers 
of that grade. No one ever speaks of the victory of Gen- 
eral Miller and the gallant Colonel Brown at Niagara. 
Likewise, there were no divided honors at the battle of the 
Thames. The glories should go to the army, and it was 
under his command alone. The praise should go to the 
whole army, and not to some single individual. If any 
one, more than another, shared in the councils of the com- 
mander, it was the greatest of Kentucky's soldiers, Gov- 
ernor Shelby, the hero of King's Mountain. Finally, in 
proof of his position, Harrison called attention to the mes- 
sage of Monroe, to the resolutions of Congress, to the word 
of Governor Shelby, to the report of Commodore Perry, to 
that of General Wood, and finally to the history of the war 
written by Robert B. McAfee, who served under Johnston. 

The partisans and fellow-soldiers of the old hero heard 
his call like a command. The reference to Governor Shelby 
fired the Kentucky Whigs. During the fall General Har- 
rison made trips down the Ohio, being hailed everywhere 
as an old friend. Everybody except a few of the Jacksonian 
precinct politicians joined in the barbecues, parades, ban- 
quets, and celebrations in his honor. At Madison, Louis- 
ville, New Albany, and Vincennes he was received by the 
undivided populace. A description of these military spec- 
tacles, the toasts, and set orations, filled the press of the 
Ohio river towns. The editors were always made the sec- 
retaries of the meetings. 

On November 7-15, 1835, a monster meeting was held 
on the Tippecanoe battlefield. Isaac Naylor, the veteran 
editor of the Crawfordsville Record, and a soldier at Tippe- 
canoe, was the speaker of the day. Dr. Deming pro- 
nounced an eulogy on Harrison. All then repaired to the 
feast. The barbecue was served on three tables each one 



314 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

hundred yards long. These were filled twice by the multi- 
tude. 

Harrison was formally nominated for the presidency 
by this meeting. But by this time the Harrison boom was 
in full career elsewhere. Editor John Douglas, of the In- 
diana Jommal, November 13, 1835, said there was a steady 
manifestation of interest in the comxing candidacy of Gen- 
eral Harrison."'^ It was not a preconcerted series of meet- 
ings, and there was no articulation to the campaign, but 
Harrison banquets were held in every county. Papers were 
filled with discussions of his battles. Incidents and anec- 
dotes were met with in all papers. County meetings 
solemnly resolved that he was a fit candidate for the presi- 
dency. 

These early meetings were apparently non-political. 
Nothing offensively partisan was ever brought up. Neither 
the name Whig, Democrat, Jackson men, Clay men, nor any 
of the other numerous epithets, by which one or the other 
political party was known, were used by the speakers. 

One of the first of these meetings in Indiana was called 
by John Vawter, a patriarch of the Baptist church. The 
meeting was held at old Vernon. Here is perhaps a proper 
place to note a phase of this campaign not generally recog- 
nized. This meeting would probably have passed resolu- 
tions condemning Clay with as much unanimity, if not with 
as much enthusiasm, as it showed when endorsing Har- 
rison. Clay never received the support of the church peo- 
ple of the State, if the newspapers can be taken as evidence. 
The Quakers, Baptists, Presbyterians, and Methodists, 
especially the preachers, continually found fault with his 
drunkenness, his gambling, his profanity, to mention only 
a few of the immoralities he was charged with. The edi- 
tors tried in the earlier years to explain or condone these 
faults as the unavoidable characteristics of all really great 
men, but in later years, especially since his defeat in 1832, 

3-1 A meetiiifr at Bi'ookville, Feb. 7, 1835. endorsed the nomination 
of Han-ison previously made in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Enos MeCarty, 
a Democrat. i)resided. liuliuna American, quoted in Indiana Journal, 
Feb. 27. 1835. 



POLITICS 315 

they had ceased, and now gave full publicity to all rumors 
of that kind. 

In every question that arose during that quarter of a 
century Clay, they charged, threw the weight of his influ- 
ence against good morals. The opposite was true of Har- 
rison, and the humble church folks of the northwest turned 
with hope from such characters as Clay, Van Buren, Web- 
ster, and Buchanan. 

The meeting at Vernon was followed by a similar one 
at Lexington, presided over by Col. Abraham Kimberlin, 
and addressed by the venerable Col. James Goodhue, a 
crippled soldier, whom Jackson had dismissed from the 
postoffice, over the protest of the whole neighborhood, after 
almost a lifetime of honest service. 

Every paper of the period contains some reference to 
a county meeting, and the Whig papers mixed up the ac- 
counts with criticism of the high-handed, straight-arm 
methods of the administration men. 

The Van Buren papers tried in vain for a hearing. 
The people would have no patience with them. In fact, 
many of them that were free of federal patronage boldly 
took their places in the Harrison ranks and received the 
name, "dugout" Whigs. The faithful discipline under which 
Jackson had compelled his editors to defend his adminis- 
tration now reacted against them. People discounted 
everything the editor said as if it were handed down. John 
Douglas, editor of the Indiana Journal, had referred to 
Jackson editors a few years ago as wearing the "chain 
and collar" of their master. The reference was catchy and 
durmg this and the succeeding campaign they were usually 
referred to as the "collar" press. 

The Harrison Convention met at Indianapolis Decem- 
ber 14, 1835. It proved to be a reunion of the heroes of 
Tippecanoe. Many of them had never taken part in poli- 
tics, but when they heard the call of their old commander 
they rallied for his support. It seemed to the common 
people an insult to thus challenge these old soldiers of an 
earlier generation.''"' 

35Vev;iv Wccl-hi Mc^xnificr. Dec. 2(). ISHo. 



316 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The aged preacher, John Vawter of Vernon, called the 
Indianapolis convention to order. Marston G. Clark, whose 
name recalled the memory of his kinsman, George Rogers 
Clark, and who himself had been a distinguished pioneer 
of the State, and had served as aid in the Tippecanoe cam- 
paign, choosing the site for the night camp which became 
the battle ground and for the selection of which Harrison 
had been so unjustly censured, was called to preside. He 
was escorted to the chair by Judge William Polke, who 
had served as chief of scouts for General Harrison and had 
been interpreter in the last interview with the Prophet the 
night before the battle, and Jordan Vigus, likewise a hero 
of Tippecanoe. As this trio of heroes marched up the aisle, 
gray and grizzled with hardships, but firm and erect as 
when they marched up the Wabash twenty-four years be- 
fore, the Van Buren politicians present saw they had unin- 
tentionally awakened a dormant force in Indiana that was 
beyond their control. As vice presidents of the convention 
there sat beside Clark, Gen. John G. Clendennin of Orange 
county and General Samuel Carr of Clark county, two of 
the strongest supporters of Jackson in the State. 

The speech of Clark, recounting the achievements of 
Harrison by one who was, as all knew, giving no idle 
praise, carried the convention away. Speeches by Polke, 
Naylor, and others kept up enthusiasm. A misguided poli- 
tician, who mentioned Johnson as a possible running mate 
for Harrison, apologized to the convention for the insult. 
The addresses filled the first pages of the newspapers and 
swept the country like a prairie fire. 

The election of 1836 had all the moral eflfects of a de- 
feat for both parties in Indiana, at least so far as the news- 
papers were concerned. The Democrats were completely 
defeated, but, to the disgust of the Whig editors, remained 
in possession of the battlefield. 

At the suggestion of the Richmond Palladium the Whig 
editors formed an editorial association and made system- 
atic war on the enemy. The Palladium carried, during the 
whole period from 1836 to 1840 as a motto, the words of 
Senator N. P. Tallmadge of New York — "Uncompromising 



POLITICS 317 

Hostility to the Reelection of Martin Van Buren." The 
Indiana Journal and other newspapers likewise kept their 
battle flags floating, or, as they expressed it, had nailed 
their colors to the masts. In December, 1839, the National 
Whig Convention of Harrisburg placed Harrison again in 
the field as a presidential candidate. This was done largely 
in deference to the voice of the northwest as expressed in 
previous State conventions. 

A great campaign must have live contributory issues. 
The Whig convention at Harrisburg had wisely refrained 
from adopting any platform, thus leaving its campaigners 
and its press a wide latitude for the contest. In Indiana, 
especially, it was almost impossible to say what was the 
paramount issue. There was a State governor and a legis- 
lature to elect, as well as a President of the nation. 

The liquor question had been for years causing a great 
deal of thinking, especially among the members of the 
Evangelical churches. Numerous societies, called the 
Washingtonians, were organized throughout the State. The 
agitation was nation-wide and then, as now, proved a 
boomerang to every party that trifled with it. During the 
winter of 1838 and 1839 thieves and gamblers rendezvoused 
in the taverns of Indianapolis and for the first time terror- 
ized the capital. A grand jury spent some time making 
the investigation."" 

There was no lack of orators then to show the direct 
and sinister connection between taverns and politics. 
Other orators stood firmly for personal freedom and the 
rights of the individual. Between these extremes the great 
body of Hoosiers, in earnest humor, discussed, in school 
and out, the traditional questions of politics, the tariff, the 

36 In the Indiana Journal of M:iy 18. 1839. was printed their reiiort 
on "Groceries and Grog Shops." "We have come to the unanimous con- 
clusion that houses kept expressly for the sale of spirituous liquors are 
highly injurious to the peace, good order and general welfare of this 
.or any other community. We are satisfied that laws licensing such are 
unwise and impolitic and ought to be repealed. They are abettors of 
crime and immorality. They are nuisances. They rob the poor and 
break up families. We appeal to the General Assembly to banish one 
of the gi-eatest evils that mars the peace and prosperity and happiness 
of our country." 



318 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bank, the boundaries, slavery, internal improvements, pub- 
lic lands, and, above all, the "glorious achievements" or 
the "blundering stupidity" of General Harrison. 

As observed before. General Harrison was an ideal 
newspaper candidate. His life and exploits lent themselves 
to picturesque descriptions. Especially was this true here 
in Indiana, where much of his life had been spent. Scarcely 
a neighborhood but contained some of his comrades in 
arms. These were sought out and by the liberal aid of the 
editor they prepared endless anecdotes and incidents of 
former campaigns. The veterans of Tippecanoe were given 
the place of honor on the platform where powerful orators 
referred to their snowy locks and eminent services. They 
were feasted and toasted at monster barbecues until it 
seemed the State was trying to atone for having so long 
neglected its own heroes. 

The State campaign was as stoutly contested as the na- 
tional. The election of 1839 was over before the panic 
struck the State and the General Assembly stood as unde- 
cided before the situation as did the people. But, taking 
up the murmur of the people, it plunged into the chaos of 
State affairs. The House called for no less than seventeen 
formal reports on internal improvements, and the Senate 
eighteen. No one knew what the reports meant. The As- 
sembly through a long session of eighty-five days was a 
hotbed of petty politics. The Indiana Journal thus an- 
nounced its adjournment: "This body, after a stormy, pro- 
tracted, and useless session of eighty-five days, has at last 
adjourned, and may heaven for all time save us from such 
another." The reports collected by the General Assembly 
furnished an exhaustless supply of materials for stump 
speakers and newspapers. 

Before the year 1840 the politicians of the two parties 
were fencing for position. The Democrats in the General 
Assembly called for a caucus, and the Whigs, on December 
14, 1839, met at the State House with Samuel Judah, presi- 
dent, and Charles Test, secretary, and solemnly protested 
against the undemocratic performance. Their "weighty" 
resolutions against caucuses went the rounds of the Whig 



POLITICS 319 

press and were praised even by the moderate or "dugout" 
Democrats. 

The Whigs nominated Judge Samuel Bigger of Rush 
county, a graduate of Athens (Ohio) University, a distin- 
guished legislator and judge, and an eloquent stump 
speaker. The Democrats nominated Gen. Tilghman How- 
ard, a native of South Carolina, and a resident of Parke 
county.'^' 

January 15, a county convention met at Bedford. John 
Edwards was chairman, R. W. Thompson reported the 
resolutions and held the crowd spellbound in a two-hour 
speech. George G. Dunn followed in an oration of equal 
length. One hundred and sixty-six delegates were ap- 
pointed to attend the State convention. 

Other counties sent delegations of similar size. The 
delegates began to arrive in Indianapolis January 14. Two 
days before the time for opening the convention the legis- 
lative hall was crowded with "Democratic Whigs." Speak- 
ers followed each other through long day and night ses- 
sions. Citizens generously opened their homes to the dele- 
gates, after the taverns were full. By January 16 the capi- 
tal was flooded with visitors. Samuel Judah of Knox was 
chairman. John Beard of Montgomery, James Blair of 
Vermillion, James T. Moffatt of Vigo, Samuel Herriott of 
Johnson, Thomas D. Baird of St. Joseph, William H. Ben- 
nett of Union, Morris Lancaster of Wayne, Philip Sweetser 

^57 Among Whig speakers of State tame were Joseph (i. Marshall, 
O. H. Smith, George Dumi. Albert White, Willard Herod, Caleb Smith. 
R. W. Thomi)soii. Henry S. Lane, Othniel Clark. Newton Claypool. Sam- 
uel O. Sample, Thomas J. Evans, Hugh O'Neill. Selmyler Colfax. John 
Vawter. Milton Stapp. John Dumont. Stephen C. Stephens. Jeremiah 
Sullivan, Joseph C. Egglestou. William G. Ewing, James H. Cravens, 
Jonathan McCarty. John Ewing. (ieorge H. Dunn. Samuel Judah. llan- 
dall Crawford, Thomas H. Blake. Elisha Huntington, Judge De Bruler. 
Charles Dewey and Conrad Baker. Among the Democrats the best 
campaigners were General Howard. Edward Hannegan, James Whit- 
comb, Marinus W^illet. Eindley Bigger, Amos Lane. Thomas Smith. Rob- 
ert Dale Owen, John Law. Joseph A. Wright, John G. Davis, Paris C. 
Dunning, Delauey Eckels, Ahin P. Hovey, Andrew Kennedy. John Spen- 
cer, Elisha Long. Nathaniel West, N. B. Palmer, General Drake, John 
Can-, William W. Wick. James Brown Ray. Joseph Holman and Ross 
Smiley. 



320 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

of Marion, Joseph Robinson of Ripley, and John Zenor of 
Harrison, all members of the General Assembly, were ap- 
pointed an executive committee to conduct the campaign. 

Every county was instructed to hold a convention and 
form county and township organizations and provide for 
county and township celebrations. Marion county met Feb- 
ruary 18, Harrison county on the 22d, and so on. There 
were conventions of young men, as in Fountain county 
February 22, Marion county March 5, Marshall county 
March 22, Miami county March 3; Huntington, Wells, 
Adams, Jay and Blackford all sent reports in together. 

The "first voters" met at the Tippecanoe Battleground 
May 29. Harrison Democrats celebrated in Shelby county 
February 22, and were addressed by James Farrington. 

A large delegation tramped off to Ohio to attend a cele- 
bration at Fort Meigs, May 9. By this time Harrison 
marching clubs were organized in many counties. A rally 
was called for Decatur county March 22. Almost every 
voter in the county was present. By eleven o'clock in the 
morning, Greensburg was full of people. Word came that 
township delegations were approaching. A procession 
headed by the Greensburg band formed and moved down 
the Michigan Road to meet the Adams township delega- 
tion. At the head of the latter was a monster canoe drawn 
by six gray horses. In the canoe were a band and a vet- 
eran of '76, frosty headed, but carrying a large banner. 
The other township delegations were likewise intercepted, 
after which the long column paraded the town to the court- 
house square, where the inevitable speaking began. De- 
scriptions of such meetings appeared in all papers and in 
almost every issue. At Connersville the lowest estimate of 
the crowd was ten thousand. The canoe was fifty feet long. 
A log cabin 8x12 was a part of the parade; another float 
contained a threshing floor with four men using flails ; the 
Hagerstown men attended in their canoe ; Rush county sent 
1,000 men with a buckeye canoe ; Union county sent a troop 
of dragoons amied and in uniform. There was no end to 



POLITICS 321 

the barbecues, and celebrations, and mass meetings, no 
limit to the pranks of the zealous Whigs. 

The culmination came in the Battleground Convention 
of May 29. Indianapolis was the rallying ground for the 
southeastern part of the State, Delegates and delegations 
began to arrive May 25. It rained during the three preced- 
ing days, but no one complained. The women of the cap- 
ital had prepared two beautiful banners. After the pre- 
sentation ceremonies, the column began to get under way, 
marching in squadrons of 200 each. Those on horseback 
took the lead, followed by carriages and wagons with a long 
rearguard on foot. Many of the latter trudged barefoot 
through the black mud of the Michigan road, carrying their 
shoes in their hands. The column was said to be twenty- 
five miles long. Comcribs, haystacks, parlors, kitchens, 
barns, bedrooms, all were thrown open along the way to 
this army of pilgrims. Everybody was welcome every- 
where. Every cabin had its banner up and barrel out. The 
White Horse Trained Band from Fayette county attracted 
most attention. Single delegations of 1,000 men came 
marching. The Battlegrounds were white with tents. 
There were men from nearly every State in the Union. 

In one place was a group of patriot survivors of the 
Revolution, in another the heroes of Fort Meigs, and in 
still another those of Tippecanoe, the Levites who were to 
act as high priests at this shrine. The veteran preacher, 
John Vawter, called the "nations" to order and turned the 
meeting over to Gen. John McCarty. Judge William Polke, 
Thomas Hinds, of Illinois, and Isaac Naylor, survivors all 
of the battle, made brief addresses, after which Judge Big- 
ger, the orator of the day, spoke two hours. James Brooks, 
editor of the New York Express, followed with an oration. 
After this came the crowning act of the meeting. The sur- 
viving soldiers gathered together at the Battleground 
House, formed in order, whereupon Judge Polke produced 
the old banner under which Captain Spier Spencer's Yellow 
Jackets had fought, under which those two heroes of the 
militia, Spencer and Warrick, had died, and which Colonel 



322 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Tipton had carried, and under it again these old men 
marched to the stand, where Mr. Polke presented it to Edi- 
tor Brooks to be kept by him till the inauguration of Har- 
rison, to whom it was then to be presented and by whom 
it was to be placed among the archives of the nation. 

It was a perfect delirium of sentiment. The Democrats 
stood off and wondered if their good neighbors would ever 
return to their senses. The State enjoyed a carnival of 
oratory. Joint discussions were held, in one of which it 
is said two speakers talked two days, occupying two hours 
each, forenoon and afternoon. A part of the itinerary of 
the candidate for governor. Judge Bigger, will illustrate 
the strenuous life of the spellbinders during the cam- 
paign.-^ ^ 

On this trip he traveled horseback 700 miles, made thir- 
ty-three speeches, each two to four hours long. 

The campaign closed with a monster parade in Indian- 
apolis the night before the election. Mr. Whitcomb, later 
governor, was to speak on the North Side, and Senator 0. 
H. Smith on the South Side. After waiting till midnight 
for the noise to subside the two speakers left their stand. 
After the State election the Democrats gave up the contest 
and sanity gradually returned to the people. In the State 
election Samuel Bigger was elected by over 9,000 plurality. 
The State senate stood 31 to 15 in favor of the Whigs. 
The house stood 78 to 22, showing thus more decisively 
the results of the campaign. Harrison carried the State 
in the following November by 13,698 majority. 

38 On one of his trips lie left (ireeiisbury- on horseback and, after 
speaking there April 6. April 7 he spoke at Versailles. April 8 at Vevay, 
April 9 at Maclisou. April 10 at Charlestown. April 11 at New Albany. 
April 13 at Corydon, April 15 at Leavenworth, April 16 at Fredonia, 
April 17 at Rome. April IS at Troy. April 20 at Roekport. April 21 at 
Boonville. April 22 at Evansville. April 24 at Mt. Vernon, April 25 at 
Cynthiana, April 27 at Princeton. April 28 at Petersburg. April 29 at 
Vincennes, May 1 at Merom. May 2 at Caledonia. :May 4 at Terre Haute, 
May 6 at Bowling Green. May 7 at (Jreencastle. May 8 at Danville, May 
9 at Indianapolis. 



CHAPTER XIV 

removal of the indians from the state 

§ 60 The Treaty Grounds 

The little garrison under Maj. Josiah H. Vose at Fort 
Wayne was withdrawn April 19, 1819. ^ They were the 
last regular soldiers on frontier duty in the State. The 
westward movement of settlers had carried the frontier be- 
yond Indiana. 

Fort Wayne was then a busy center of the fur trade. 
Often 1,000 men were collected there on Indian pay day. 
At such times horse-racing, gambling, drunkenness and 
debauchery were the order until the traders had all the 
Indians' annuity money in their possession. - 

In 1823 John Tipton became the agent of the Miamis 
and Pottawattomies, with headquarters at Fort Wayne. As 
the settlements around the place increased the Indians fell 
back on the upper Wabash and Eel rivers. Partly that he 
might be nearer the Indians and partly due to interest in 

1 ^'incennes Centinel, July 19, 1S19. 

- Robert S. Robertson, VuUey of the Upper Mauiin'c I. 1.S4. The fol- 
lowing pariigrapli from Rev. J. K. Finley, Life Among the Indians, 518, 
describes these scenes. The missionary was an eye witness: "This was 
an awfnl scene for a sober man to look npon. Here were encamped be- 
tween two and three hundred Indians, and one third if not one-half 
drunk; men and women, raving maniacs, singing, dancing, fighting, stab- 
bing, and tomahawking one another — and there were the rumsellers 
watering their whisky until it was not strong grog, and selling it for 
four dollars a gallon — their hired men gathering up all the skins and 
furs, and their silver trinkets, ear-bobs, arm-bands, half-moons, silver 
crosses, and brooches — giving a gill of grog for a dozen of silver brooches 
— and their guns, tomahawks and blankets, till they were literally 
stripped naked, and three or four were killed or wounded. The reader 
may set what estimate he pleases, or call him by what name: yet if 
there was ever a greater robber, or a meaner thief, or a dirtier mur- 
derer than these rumsellers, he is yet to be seen." 



324 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

land speculation, Mr. Tipton secured the removal of the 
Indian Agency, in the spring of 1828, to the mouth of Eel 
river, the present site of Logansport. 

The Indian trade at that time was one of the most lucra- 
tive occupations in the State. The agent bought large num- 
bers of cattle, hogs, and horses for the Indians. Droves of 
stock were gathered up and driven through the forests to 
Fort Wayne or Logansport. 

By the law of 1819 the Indians of Indiana were granted 
annuities as follows: Weas, $3,000; Pottawattomies, 
§2,500; Delawares, $4,000; Miamis, $15,000; besides which 
there were specific gifts which often amounted to as much 
as the annuities. Thus at this time, 1819, the Delawares, 
then preparing to go west, were given $13,000.=^ 

The annual assembly at the Treaty Grounds was the 
greatest commercial event of northern Indiana from 1820 
to 1840. It corresponded with the New Orleans trade in 
the southern part of the State. At the treaties of October 
20, 26 and 27, 1832, there were distributed goods to the 
value of $365,729.87.4 There were not less than fifty trad- 
ers on the grounds. The bills of W. G. and G. W. Ewing 
footed up about $30,000. Joseph Holman, a member of the 
First Constitutional Convention; Jonathan Jennings, our 
first governor; John W. Davis of Carlisle, long a member 
of Congress and at one time its speaker; Allen Hamilton, 
president of the Fort Wayne Branch of the State Bank; 
Samuel Hanna, founder of Fort Wayne ; Nicholas McCarty, 
a merchant of Indianapolis and later a Whig candidate for 
governor; Alexis Coquillard, founder of South Bend; Jor- 
dan Vigus, one of the founders of Logansport, were a few 
of the better known traders and agents. It is hardly nec- 
essary to say these were the leading men of the northern 
part of the State. Many of them became wealthy in this 

3 United Staics Statutes at Large 1819, ch. I.XXXVII. 

4 Senate Document, Indian Removals, V, 1834-5. First Sess. 2Sd Conri. 
The Treaty Grounds were on the Tippecanoe river near its mouth. The 
assemblies were not all held at the same place. Some were held at the 
Big Springs where Wabash is now, some on the site of Huntington, 
some at the mouth of the Mississinewa and many down on the old Tip- 
pecanoe Battleground. 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 325 

business. It was said that the Ewing brothers became 
millionaires."' 

At this time it is hardly possible to determine the profit 
made by the traders. Blankets sold at $8 and $10 each; 
red flannel at 57 cents; bleached shirting at 9714 cents; 
tincups at I21/2 cents; red cotton handkerchiefs at 40 cents; 
calico at 25 cents; silk vests at $4; coffee boilers at 75 
cents; thread at $2 per pound; hats at $5; knives at 40 
cents; powder at 40 cents. The quality of the goods can- 
not now be ascertained. The traders sold on credit to the 
Indians and then presented their bills to the Indian agents 
who paid the annuities. This plan was tolerably satisfac- 
tory until the greedy traders presented bills which 
amounted to more than all the annuities. Then there was 
trouble among the traders. 

At the October payment, 1836, the Ewing brothers and 
Captain Fitch presented claims for $34,000. As the pay- 
ment of this would have taken all the money the other 
traders objected. The agent, Abel Pepper of Rising Sun, 
was unable to settle this dispute. A committee then re- 
ceived all the claims, amounting to over $100,000, and pro- 
rated the annuity money. This wrong to the Indians was 
so plain that a government agent, J. W. Edmunds, was 
sent to investigate the claims. His report showed beyond 
a doubt that the Indians had been cheated out of practically 
all their money. ^ 

§ 61 Black Hawk's War 

As long as the first pioneers of our State lived they 
feared and hated the Indians. It was difficult to tell 
whether they feared or hated them most. During the dec- 
ade from 1830 to 1840 they gave a good exhibition of each. 
From their own viewpoint they were amply justified in 
both. As an example of the terror which an Indian up- 
rising caused on the border there is nothing better than 
Black Hawk's War. 

5 Senate Docuiiients. Indian Removals, \, 371 seq. 1S34-5. 

6 Logansport Telegraph, October 15. 1836, aucl succeeding issues. 

(22) 



326 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Black Hawk was a popular leader of a band of Sauk 
Indians who lived on Rock river, in northwestern Illinois. 
His village was near the mouth of the river, down where it 
joined the Mississippi. The old warriors in this band were 
kindred spirits who had served under Tecumseh in the 
War of 1812. They were known along the frontier as the 
"British Band," and their sympathy for the British was 
notorious. The Hawk had himself "touched the quill," as 
the Indians called signing a treaty, in 1804 and again in 
1816, when his tribe had ceded its land to the government. 

But when the government surveyors and the settlers 
came in 1831 to occupy the land the grizzly old warrior's 
heart failed him. He had watched his women and children 
cultivate the village fields for half a century, and when, in 
the spring of 1831, he returned from a winter's hunt in 
Iowa to find the squatters had pre-empted his fields and 
actually plowed up the graves of his ancestors, he could 
stand it no longer. He warned the intruders and then 
started with his warriors across northern Indiana and 
southern Michigan to visit his British friend, the com- 
mander of Maiden. The British general advised him 
wrongly and the war followed. 

All the border Indians were restless during that year. 
Early in the summer of 1831 a Miami hunting party killed 
a Pottawattomie war chief, as a result of which the Potta- 
wattomies threatened war. They first demanded an indem- 
nity of $50,000 as blood money. If this was not forthcom- 
ing the Miamis were assured that the Pottawattomies 
would be on them in the spring "before the leaves were as 
big as squirrels' ears." 

Gen. William Marshall was sent as agent to settle this 
difficulty; and in a grand council on the St. Joseph suc- 
ceeded in doing so. 

About this time a proclamation of Gov. John Reynolds 
of Illinois reached the Indiana border. The frontier settle- 
ments at this time were between the Wabash and the Illi- 
nois State line, west and northwest of Lafayette, with ad- 
vance posts over the line in Illinois twenty to forty miles. 
When Black Hawk returned from his winter's hunt he 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 327 

warned the squatters to leave. The governor of Illinois 
took this warning for a declaration of war, and at once 
called out the Illinois State militia and notified the people 
that the Sauk and Pottawattomies were on the warpath. 
The governor meant the Prairie Pottawattomies of Illinois, 
but the Indiana settlers thought he meant the Indiana Pot- 
tawattomies, many of whom lived among the settlers west 
of the Wabash. A courier carried the report to Indian 
Agent Marshall at Logansport, who at once dispatched his 
runners in all directions to gather the scattered villages of 
Pottawattomies into Logansport till the war was over. He 
did this to pacify the settlers and to save the Indians from 
the militia. 

At midnight Sunday, May 21, 1832, Captain Newell of 
the Warren county militia, was called out of bed and told 
that the Indians were at Iroquois, near the State line, and 
approaching fast. He was told that all the settlements 
west of Big Pine creek, in Warren county, had given way 
and Big Pine would break in the morning, if no aid ap- 
peared. 

Bj^ eight o'clock Captain Newell was at the head of fifty 
mounted men, and by eleven o'clock had reached Parish's 
Grove, eighteen miles on his way. Here he met the throng 
of refugees from the Sugar Creek Settlements. The rabble 
of refugees completely blocked the way. The settlers of 
upper Pine creek had abandoned their clearings. After 
Captain Newell had calmed the terror-stricken pioneers, he 
selected twenty-five of his best-mounted men and pressed 
forward that same evening twenty miles farther, to Iro- 
quois river, in Illinois. He passed scores of settlers flee- 
ing for their lives. From these he heard that the Hickory 
Creek Settlements had all been abandoned and the people 
were on their way to the Wabash. Several families were 
reported murdered on Fox river. The Fox River Settle- 
ment was seventy-five miles farther on, but Captain Newell 
decided to go ahead and try to reach it by morning. A few 
miles further he met more refugees from Hickory creek, 
who assured him that not a person was left in the outlying 



328 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

settlement, and that it would be useless to go on. The cap- 
tain accordingly returned and began to quiet the people. 

As soon as Captain Newell received word of the out- 
break, on Sunday night, he sent a mounted scout posthaste 
to Lafayette for aid. Another report reached Lafayette, 
also, about the same time as the courier, that the Illinois 
militia, 275 in number, had been routed on Hickory creek, 
with the loss of over twenty-five men killed; that 200 mi- 
litiamen were needed; that the settlers had all fled, some 
to Fort Chicago and others to the Wabash ; that the whole- 
frontier was abandoned, and that houses were being burned 
and families murdered. 

A small party of militia scouts immediately set out from 
Lafayette for the scene of the depredation, and Gen. Jacob 
Walker called out the militia to rendezvous at Sugar Creek 
Grove in the western part of Benton county. 

Meantime the scouts who set out from Lafayette at the 
first alarm returned and, on June 1, a committee of the best 
known men of the town sent out a statement to the effect 
that they had gone as far as Hickory creek, 100 miles north- 
west of Lafayette, and had found no traces of Indian war- 
fare. No damage had been done on Hickory creek. They 
reported, however, that Black Hawk, at the head of 500 
warriors, wiis in arms and on the warpath, but was mak- 
ing his way toward the Mississippi. 

The militia camp at Sugar Creek Grove was soon 
broken up. The returning scouts made it certain that Black 
Hawk had his hands full and that there was no danger 
from that quarter. Word was received in a few days from 
the deputy agent, M. G. Grover, at Logansport, that the 
Miamis, Pottawattomies, Chippewas, and Ottawas on the 
St. Joseph were all quiet. When this word came, General 
Walker disbanded his militia. 

The alarm was not confined to Warren and Benton 
counties. The old Sac, or "Sauk," trail from Illinois to Mai- 
den led through LaPorte county. The early settlers of 
Door Village were accustomed to seeing Sac, or "Sauk," 
warriors pass and repass on this trail. At times the In- 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 329 




Indian Cessions. By E. V. Shocklet. 



330 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

dians stole horses and committed other crimes. The set- 
tlers along the trail feared them. 

In May the Indian agent at Chicago sent a courier to 
warn the pioneers of the Door Village (LaPorte) that the 
Sacs were on the war path. It is said that refugees from 
Door Village fled as far as Cincinnati. The more resolute 
gathered in the little village and set to work to build a stout 
stockade. As soon as this was completed they sent out 
spies to learn what they could of the Indian advance. In 
the meantime a good blockhouse was constructed." After 
a few weeks the excitement wore off. There was ample rea- 
son for fear along the frontier of the State. Had Black 
Hawk chosen to lead his warriors along the Sac Trail to his 
old British friends and allies at Maiden, there were not 
enough troops or settlers along the way to have prevented 
him. 

The refugees from the Portage Prairie, Terre Coupee, 
and other settlements west of South Bend brought the 
news of the Indian war to that town. Most of the refugees 
were so alarmed they would not stop in South Bend, but 
hurried on to the east. As soon as the citizens were 
aroused they gathered together and, like the friends to the 
west, at the Door Village and on Portage Prairie, decided 
that safety lay in a blockhouse. Accordingly they built one 
and confidently awaited the coming of Black Hawk's war- 
riors.^ 

As soon as General Walker received the first report of 
an Indian uprising from Captain Newell he sent a messen- 
ger to Indianapolis. The messenger reached the governor 
May 29, 1832, and requested him to call out the militia for 
the Black Hawk War. The militia of Marion, Johnson, and 
Hendricks counties were accordingly called to meet at In- 
dianapolis. These troops, the pick of the three counties, 
150 in number, under Col. A. W. Russel, of the Forty- 
eighth Regiment, reached Lafayette June 1-3. From 
Lafayette they crossed over into Illinois, marched to 

7 Geuernl .Tasper Packard, Hintonj <if Lal'orte County. 53. 

8 Judge Timothy E. Howard, Histort/ of St. Joseph Cniinti/. Indiana 
(index). 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 331 

Chicago, back around the south end of Lake Michigan, then 
by way of the St. Joseph country to Indianapohs, without 
seeing any hostile Indians. When they arrived at home 
they were banquetted as heroes at Washington Hall and the 
Mansion House hotels. They received the name "The 
Bloody 300" as a result of their campaign. 

At the same time when Governor Noah Noble called out 
the Marion, Johnson, and Hendricks county militia, he or- 
dered a company of mounted volunteers from Putnam coun- 
ty to patrol the State line and watch for straggling bands 
of Indians that might attempt inroads on the settlements. 
General Orr, accordingly, enrolled eighty-two men, armed 
with rifles, tomahawks and butcher-knives. The company 
estabhshed headquarters at Attica and stationed guards 
along the State line. Patrols passed from one station to 
another every day and also reported daily to Attica. This 
was continued until August 10. 

As soon as Senator John Tipton, who then represented 
Indiana in the United States Senate, heard that Black 
Hawk was on the war path, he proposed to call out 600 
rangers to patrol the frontier till the war was ended. Con- 
gress quickly passed the measure. Two of the companies 
were to be furnished by Indiana. One was raised by Major 
B. V. Beckes, of Vincennes, the other by Colonel Lemuel 
Ford, of Charlestown. Colonel Ford's rangers reached In- 
dianapolis July 28, 1832. At this place they were joined 
by a party from Rush county under Lieutenant Bissell. All 
were well mounted and well drilled. Nearly all the people 
of the town turned out to see them march away next morn- 
ing over the Michigan Road toward Logansport and Chi- 
cago, where they were to report to General Scott. They 
were enrolled for a year or less, furnished their own horses 
and weapons, and received $1.00 per day. 

Captain Beckes also hastened to the frontier with his 
company, but Black Hawk's band was annihilated at Bad 
Axe August 2, and all the troops were soon discharged. One 
thousand Sauk Indians had entered Illinois in April, but by 
the 3d of August not more than 150 were left alive. None 



332 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

had come nearer to Indiana than seventy-five miles. The 
scare had come from three sources. First, the Sauks had 
defeated a large army of militia — 2,500 — under Stillman, on 
Rock river, and the agent at Chicago had sent the news to 
the settlements, with the added information that the war- 
riors would devastate the settlements. Second, the pioneers 
knew the Pottawattomies were closely related to the Sauks. 
Third, a large body of Sauk warriors had crossed northern 
Indiana just at the beginning of the war.'^ 

§ 62 The Removal of the Miamis and Pottawattomies 

The excitement caused by the Black Hawk War was the 
doom of the Indian population in Indiana. Although the 
Indians of Indiana were perfectly quiet and had nothing to 
do with causing the scare, the settlers seemed unable to 
accustom themselves to their presence in the neighbor- 
hood. 

As early as 1819 Congress had discussed plans for civi- 
lizing the Indians.^" A lav/ of that year gave the Presi- 
dent power to use $10,000 to pay the tuition of Indian chil- 
dren in mission schools. Several mission schools had been 
established in the State and were said to have done good 
work.'^ However, there was no well organized support 
back of the law and nothing on a considerable scale was ac- 
complished. 

In 1822 the system of government traders was abol- 
ished and a horde of irresponsible, depraved traders were 

^ Judge Thomas S. Staufield. iu Histori/ of St. ■JoscpJi Counfy. 44!). 
Timothy Howard, St. Joseph Count]/. 1. 29.'->. An excellent account of 
this whole "War" is given by Sanford C. Cox. Old Settlers. 86-98. For 
a complete contemporary history see Wakefield's History of the Blaelc 
Haick War. The mounted ranger service was authorized b.v Act of 
June 15. 1832. This authorized the president to enroll six companies 
of 100 men each. Statutes at Large. 1832. ch. CXXXI. All the details, 
are given in the Indiana Demoerat and the Indiana Journal iinder dates 
corresponding to the above. The above account is based upon the 
JournaVs reports. 

10 United States Statutes at Larpe. 1810, ch. LXXXV. 

11 Isiiae McCoy, History of the Baptist Indian Missions; J. B. Fin- 
ley, Life Among the Indians; Jacob Piatt Dunn, True Indian Stories. 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 333 

turned into the Indian country, i- These small traders car- 
ried whisky to the Indian villages and traded it for furs. 
They were, in fact, poorly disguised robbers. 

Various missionaries and other friends of the Indians 
soon began to plead for help. Most of them agreed that 
it would be better to get the Indians beyond the frontier. 
It was a policy of the Jacksonian Democrats to get them out 
of the way of the white settlers. The law of May 28, 1830, 
permitted any Indian tribe that cared to, to trade its land 
along the border for lands beyond the Mississippi.^-^ The 
law of July 9, 1832, which provided for a complete reorgan- 
ization of the Indian service, also appropriated $20,000 to 
hold councils among the Indiana Indians in order to induce 
them to migrate beyond the Mississippi. ^^ 

During the summer of 1833, and later, agents were busy 
along the upper Wabash and on Eel river gathering up par- 
ties of Indians and transporting them to the West. A fav- 
orite plan was to give horses to a number of chiefs and pay 
their way out to the new country on a tour of inspection. 
If necessary, these were then bribed to give a glowing re- 
port of the country they had seen. The Indians were by 
that means persuaded to emigrate.^"- 

The best illustration of the hatred which the Indiana 
settlers bore toward the Indians is their treatment of the 
Pottawattomies, whom they forcibly expelled from the 
State in the summer of 1838. The Pottawattomies orig- 
inally hunted over the region south of Lake Michigan, 

1- Auiericaii State Papers. I iidlan Affairs, II. :>2G. 

13 President Monroe also had recommended this lujlicy; see Ameri- 
can State Papers, Irulian Affairs. II. 541, seq. Many Indians preferred 
to go; see Indiana Democrat, October 9. 1830. The Kicl^apoos had been 
transferred by treaty in 1820: see American State Papers, Indian 
Affairs, II, 223. The Dehiwares went beyond the Mississippi in 1820; 
see Vincennes Centinel, November 4. 1820. 

14 United, States Statutes at Large, 18.32. ch. CLXXIV ; CLXXV ; also 
for 1834. ch. CLXII. 

!«> This work extended over several years. The cost astonished even 
the liberal Congress of 1833. The Senate called for an investigation. 
The result of this was Senate Document 512, published in tive volumes 
in 1834. entitled Indian Removals. Abel Pepper was the most active 
agent in this state. 



334 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

north of the Wabash, and west of the St. Joseph and St. 
Mary's rivers. 

They were usually hostile to the Americans when war 
was on. They led in the Indian massacre at Fort Dearborn, 
and in the attack on Fort Wayne and Fort Harrison. Most 
of the warriors under the Prophet at Tippecanoe, as well as 
those who perpetrated the Pigeon Roost murders and har- 
assed the White river border from Vallonia to the Wabash 
above Vincennes during the following years, were thought 
to be Pottawattomies. On the other hand, they had given 
the settlers the land for the Michigan Road — a body of land 
equal to a strip a mile wide from the Ohio to the lake. 

Few settlers penetrated their lake-region hunting 
grounds before 1830. Beginning as early as 1817, in a 
treaty at Fort Meigs, the government adopted the unfor- 
tunate policy of making special reservations for Indian 
chiefs who refused to join the tribe in selling land. As a 
result of this policy several bands of Pottawattomies had 
special reservations in Marshall and adjoining counties. The 
treaty of 1832 took from the tribe its tribal lands, leaving 
Chief Menominee a reservation around Twin Lakes and ex- 
tending up to the present city of Plymouth. Down around 
Maxinkuckee, Chief Aubbeenaubee had a large reservation. 
Chief Benack and his village lived on a reservation in Tip- 
pecanoe township. In fact, Indians claimed and occupied 
the whole county except the strip of land given for the 
Michigan Road, a mile wide, stretching across the country 
north and south through Plymouth. 

In 1834 a commission tried to buy the Indian land and 
succeeded in making a contract for most of it at fifty cents 
an acre. But on account of some individual reservations 
made in the treaty the government refused to ratify the 
purchase. 

Col. Abel C. Pepper, of Lawrenceburg, then Indian 
agent, succeeded, in 1836, in buying the Indians out at $1 
per acre, giving the Indians the privilege of remaining two 
years on the lands. The Indians asserted that this cession 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 335 

was obtained by unfair means, but it seemed to have been 
accomplished as most others had been. 

Anticipating the land sale which was to take place when 
the Indian lease expired, August 5, 1838, squatters began 
to enter the country and settle on the Indian land. They 
expected to hold their land later by the right of pre-emption. 
The Indians began to show resentment as the time for their 
forced migration approached. They contended that the 
chiefs had no right to sell the lands, and went so far as to 
murder one of the chiefs who had "touched the quill." 

General Morgan and Colonel Pepper were busy among 
them, trying to persuade them that in the west was a much 
better place for them. Councils were held at Plymouth and 
at Dixie Lake, but the red men were obdurate. Then Col. 
Edward A. Hannegan, later a United States senator from 
Indiana, came from the post with a company of militia to 
see what effect that would have. It had none. 

Pioneers had already squatted on the Indian lands. On 
August 5 these squatters demanded possession of the In- 
dian huts and fields. Many of the Indians had been in- 
duced to plant corn. They were told that the government 
would not sell their land till it was surveyed, and that 
could not be done during the summer of 1838. 

The Indians refused to give possession and both par- 
ties resorted to violence. The fur traders in the region 
sided with the Indians and advised them to resist the squat- 
ters. The Catholic priest located at the Twin Lake Mis- 
sion also advised them that the squatters had no right to 
demand their land, especially the crop of corn which was 
now raised. 

A squatter named Waters, it seems, was especially per- 
sistent in demanding that the Indians give him possession 
of a quarter section of land he had laid claim to. About 
the middle of August some Indians battered down his cabin 
. door with an ax. In return the squatters joined together 
and burned eight or ten wigwams. 

The pioneers along the frontier were expecting trouble. 
It had been only a few years since the scare of the Black 



336 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Hawk War. The Miamis had been sullen all the season. 
Stragglers from the transported tribes were returning from 
the west and telling how their fellows had suffered from 
cold and hunger out on the plains. So when word was re- 
ceived that the Indians were committing acts of violence 
the government acted swiftly. 

Colonel Pepper called all the warriors together in coun- 
cil at Twin Lakes, August 29. He could do nothing with 
them, however. The old men had lost control of the young 
bucks. All flatly refused to leave, saying that both they 
and the President had been deceived. While they were sit- 
ting in council John Tipton with the militia arrived. The 
government agents had been preparing all summer for the 
removal of the tribe, but perhaps would not have done it 
till the cool weather of the autumn. 

As soon as Colonel Pepper of Logansport had heard 
of the first Indian depredation — and he heard as soon as a 
courier from the squatters could reach him, August 26 — he 
at once sent a dispatch by mounted courier to Governor 
David Wallace asking for a good general and at least one 
hundred soldiers. He reported that the Pottawattomies 
on Yellow river were in arms and an outbreak was ex- 
pected at any moment. This message reached Governor 
Wallace on the next day. The same day he received word 
the governor sent an order by courier to John Tipton of 
Logansport, ordering him to muster the Cass and Miami 
county militia and proceed with all haste to the scene of 
trouble. 

Tipton lost no time in enrolling the militia. They left 
Logansport at one p. m. August 29. At ten o'clock that 
night they went into camp at Chippewa. Breaking camp 
at 3 a. m., they reached Twin Lakes as above noted and 
found Colonel Pepper and the Indians in council. Tipton 
at once stated his business, scolding the chiefs for the 
depredations. The Indians made no excuses for the out- 
breaks and again refused to leave their homes. From the 
report it seems clear the whites were the aggressors and 
had done nearly all the damage. Tipton wasted no words, 
but established a camp on an island in the lake and detained 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 337 

all the Indians present, about 200. As all the leaders were 
present it was easy to control the rest. All were dis- 
armed as soon as found. 

Squads of soldiers patrolled the country in all direc- 
tions looking for the Indians and driving them in. Many, 
fearing harm to those at council, came in to see what was 
wrong. By September 1 more than 700 were rounded up. 
All the Indian wigwams and cabins were destroyed. Their 
ponies and all their other property were brought into camp. 

Early on the morning of September 4 Tipton com- 
menced to load the thirteen army wagons in which their 
goods were to be moved. About 400 horses were found 
and kept on the island till ready to start. 

The procession left the Twin Lakes, September 4, and 
dragged its mournful way south over the Michigan Road 
through Chippewa, twenty-one miles distant, going into 
camp at sunset. Father Pettit, the missionary whom 
Bishop Brute had stationed there, had been allowed to 
gather the Indians into the little chapel and say a farewell 
mass before they started. The first day's march was ex- 
cessively tiresome. No water could be found for drinking 
and the road was dusty. They traveled from 9 a. m. to 
sunset, the mounted guard prodding on the laggards. 

Next day forty-one persons were unable to move. Oth- 
ers had to wait on the sick. Beef, flour, and bacon had been 
ordered from Logansport, forty-six miles distant, but only 
a little reached them. 

On September 5 they reached Mud creek. Twenty guards 
deserted during the day, stealing Indian horses on which to 
get away. On September 6 the Indians marched seventeen 
miles reaching Logansport, about 800 strong. They waited 
near the town three days for the government agents to 
make better arrangements for traveling. One-half the 
militia were discharged and half were kept to accompany 
the Indians to the State line. 

By this time the Indian children and old people were 
completely worn out. The children, especially, were dying 
in great numbers, not being used to such fare. Physicians 



338 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

from Logansport reached them on the 9th and reported 
three hundred unfit for travel. The march from this time 
was not so rapid. William Polke took a small detachment 
of troops and revisited the abandoned villages to see if any 
Indians had returned. Several children died during the 
stay at Logansport. 

September 10, they started at 9 a. m. and skirted the 
north bank of the Wabash all day, reaching Winnamac's 
old village by 5 p. m. Food was very scarce. The priest 
was given permisison to say mass every evening. They 
left Winnamac's old village at 10 a. m., marched seventeen 
miles on the 11th, and camped at Pleasant Run at 5 p. m. 

Next day they forded the Tippecanoe at 11 a. m. and 
passed the Battleground at 12 m. Here Tipton distributed 
to the Indians $5,000 worth of dry-goods, hoping by this 
means to raise their spirits somewhat. 

Chief Wewissa's mother died on the 12th at the extreme 
age of 100. She had asked to be killed and buried with her 
fathers at the Mission and the chief had decided to humor 
her, but the white men would not permit it. 

On September 13th they reached Lagrange on the 
Wabash, a short distance below Lafayette, marching 
eighteen miles. One hundred and sixty were under the care 
of Dr. Ritchie and son, the attending physicians. The 
physicians were almost entirely out of medicine. The 
children were dying at the rate of from three to five a day. 
On the 14th they reached Williamsport. On the 16th 
they reached Danville, 111. Heat and dust were getting 
worse. Large numbers of sick had to be left in the road. 
Horses were worn out and the guards were nearly all sick, 
and unable to proceed. 

At Sandusky Point, on the 18th of September, Tipton 
turned the command over to Judge William Polke, who had 
been appointed by the national government to superintend 
the removal. 

Judge Polke, Father Pettit, and an escort of fifteen men 
continued with the broken tribe to their destination on the 
Osage river, in Kansas. 



REMOVAL OF INDIANS FROM THE STATE 339 

The journey required about two months and cost the 
lives of one-fifth of the tribe. ^^^ 

A few Indians remained in Indiana scattered on small 
reservations in various parts of the State. The larger 
numbers of these were on the lower Mississinewa, around 
Maxinkuckee Lake, and around the small lakes in Kosci- 
usko county. As citizens they were no match in their busi- 
ness dealings with their white neighbors. They gradually 
parted with their lands and spent the proceeds. A few 
remain at present, respected and treated well by their 
white neighbors. They have taken on enough of the white 
man's thrift and culture to convince anyone that the whole 
tribe might, under more fortunate circtimstances, have 
been saved to civilization. 

16 The details of this removal are jiiveii iu the Indianapolis, Logans- 
port and LaFayette papers. The Irulinna Journal, and Indiana Democrat 
of Indianapolis contain the official reports; see also Jacob P. Dunn, 
"The Trail of Death." in True Indian titories; Col. William M. Cock- 
rum, A Pioneer History of Indiana tells the stoiy J^lso. The best dis- 
cussion of this phase of our Indian history is by W. E. McDonald, of 
Plymouth, who interested the General Assembly in the matter of erect- 
ing a monument to the tribes in Marshall County. 



CHAPTER XV 
the public lands in indiana 

§ 63 The Survey, Its Methods and Area 

All the land of Indiana except the "Gore" falls under 
what is known as the Fifth System of the public lands sur- 
vey. The system was worked out by Col. Jared Mansfield, 
the surveyor-general from 1803 to 1814. The immediate 
problem that confronted Mr. Mansfield in 1803 was to sur- 
vey the Vincennes Purchase. This rectangle lay around 
and to the east of Vincennes, being entirely surrounded by 
Indian lands. The northeast corner was two miles north 
of Orleans and the southeast corner was in the northern 
part of Perry county. These are known as Freeman's Cor- 
ners from the name of the surveyor who ran the lines in 
1803. 

Through the northeast corner of the Vincennes tract 
was run the Second Principal Meridian, which struck the 
Ohio river at the east boundary of Perry county. This 
meridian governs all the survey of Indiana except that 
wedge east of the Greenville Treaty line called the "Gore." 
The first base line was surveyed by Ebenezer Buckingham 
in 1804. It follows, approximately, the old road from Vin- 
cennes to Louisville, striking the Wabash three miles above 
the mouth of White river. 

On the principal meridian, corners were set up six miles 
apart marking the tiers of townships. Other corners were 
set up one mile apart, marking the sections. On the base 
line similar corners were set up at equal intervals. The 
latter corners governed the township and section lines 
on the north side of the base line only. After the two main 
lines were surveyed the parallel lines were run six miles 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 341 

apart after which the section lines were established. In 
running the meridian section lines it was found that they 
converged at the northern base or correction line. This 
made it necessary to set a double row of section corners 
along the base lines. The ones which controlled the south- 
ern side were called the "close up" corners. 

The actual surveys were made by deputy surveyors 
hired by the United States surveyor general for the dis- 
trict. The deputies used solar compasses, transits, and 
common compasses. A surveying squad consisted of two 
chainmen, a flagman, axman, and two mound men. The 
chainmen measured the distance vvith a four, or two rod 
chain. The short chain, 33 feet long, was used on rough 
ground since, in measuring, the chain had to be level. The 
flagman led the squad placing the flag as directed by the 
surveyor. The axman cut the bushes out of the way and 
also "blazed" the trees. If a tree was a "liner" it was 
chopped, or "blazed," on both sides, if a "bearing'^' tree, 
that is, stood near the line, it was "blazed" only on the side 
facing the line. The mound men had to establish corners. 
If a tree stood exactly on the corner it was properly 
"blazed" and marked. If there was no tree a stone was 
set. If no stone was convenient a mound of dirt was 
erected. In the latter cases trees were marked as "wit- 
nesses," the surveyor recording in his field notes the direc- 
tion, distance, and size of the trees. The section and range 
stones were marked with the proper numbers and letters 
so that any one could tell the exact range, township, and 
section. 

The surveyor noted also the character of land, the tim- 
ber, and springs, on each section, and its probable value. 
All field notes were then returned to the surveyor general 
and, if approved by him, were sent to the government land 
ofiice. After all the land was sold the surveyor's notes 
and plats were turned over to the State in which the sur- 
veys were located and are now preserved at the State 
capitals. 

In the original survey only the section lines were run, 
but in making the plats the draftsman laid down the cross 

(23) 



342 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

lines dividing the section into quarters and sixteenths. The 
sections in a congressional township were numbered from 
one up to thirty-six, beginning in the northeast corner and 
numbering the tiers back and forth. The townships were 
numbered consecutively as townships north and south and 
as ranges east and west.^ The whole expense of surveying 
was not to exceed three dollars for each linear mile.- 

§ 64 Land Offices 

After a tract of land was surveyed, a land office was 
opened and the land placed on the market. As soon as 
surveyors had been put to work on the Vincennes Purchase 
a land office was authorized.- This office was ordered 
opened January 1, 1805. John Badollet, a friend of Al- 
bert Gallatin, and later a member of the State constitutional 
convention, and Nathaniel Ewing were the men placed 
in charge of the new office. Comparatively little land was 
sold here till after the close of the War of 1812. At this 
office was sold all the land then open for settlement west 
of the Second Principal Meridian. 

In 1805 a line was run from Freeman's corner near 
Orleans to the Greenville Treaty line near Brookville and 
all the government land between this and the Ohio river 
♦ was placed under survey. This tract had been purchased 
from the Indians in 1805. In 1807 a law provided for the 
opening of a land office for the tract at Jeffersonville.^ 
This office controlled the land east of the Second Principal 
Meridian. The settlers from the south, especially from 
Kentucky, who settled the hill country from New Albany 
to Bloomington entered their land at this office. They 
formed the backbone of the "southern" element in our 
population. They were Jacksonian in politics, Protestant 

1 Tl'.oin.is I>on;il(lsou. The I'ublic Donidiii. eb. VII : Pnysou .J. Treat, 
The XdtionaJ Land Systctn. cli. VIII: Miles' Weekly Register. April 12. 
1S17. The "Life i)f Ziba Foote." Vol. II. :>."»n. Iiulinmt Uistoriral Soriety 
PuhUeations. 

- United i<tatcfi Statutes at La rye. ISOi. eh. :\'j. 

s Statutes at Larye. 1804, Sess. I. cli. :>."). Tbis act also provided 
for land offices at Detroit aud Kasbaskia. 

•1 Statutes at Large, 1807, ch. 49. Sec. I. 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 343 

in religion, hostile to slavery, social, freedom-loving, poor, 
conservative, brilliant but uneducated.^ 

With the ratification of the New Purchase Treaty in 
1818 the whole of central Indiana was thrown open to the 
surveyors. The lands were divided into two districts, one 
land office being established at Brookville and the other at 
Terre Haute.'^ The two land districts were separated by 
the line separating the first and second ranges east of the 
Second Principal Meridian. The Brookville office was 
opened early in the year 1819 by Lazarus Noble, a brother 
of Senator James Noble and Governor Noah Noble. The 
settlers in the Whitewater Valley previous to this time had 
entered their lands at the Cincinnati office. This was not 
inconvenient for them since the large majority of them 
came down the Ohio or crossed it at Cincinnati. The 
Quakers were strong in this section, especially in Wayne 
county. For many years this was the most populous county 
in the State. Politically, the section was Whig, and 
aggressively anti-slavery. 

Williamson Dunn and Ambrose Whitlock opened the 
land office at Terre Haute in 1819. The settlers came very 
largely by the Wabash and hence found Terre Haute a con- 
venient point. They came from all parts of the South and 
East and had no marked racial, religious, or political char- 
acteristics. 

With the rush of settlers to the capital In 1825 the 
land office of Brookville was moved there. For a time it 
seems offices were maintained at both places. While 
Lazarus Noble was on his way to Indianapolis in October, 
1825, to open the new office he died and was succeeded by 
his brother, later Governor Noah Noble. '^ This office was 
especially active after the National Road reached Indian- 
apolis. 

By 1822 settlers were locating around Fort Wayne. 

5 Baynard R. Hall, The .Yett Purchase; Hanford A. Edson, Presby- 
terianism, in Indiana. 

6 United States Statutes at Large, 1819, ch. 92. For the terms and 
boundaries of the New Purchase see United States Statutes at Large, 
Vol. 7, Indian Treaties, 187. 

7 Indiana Journal, August 16, 1825 ; also November 22, 1S25. 



344 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

There was a large number of special reservations in that 
region but no public lands opened to settlement. Capt. 
James Riley came in the spring of 1822 and surveyed lands 
in the vicinity. The act of May 8, 1822, established a land 
office.^ The land east of the line between ranges one and 
two east and north of the Brookville District was included 
in the Fort Wayne District. The office was opened with a 
land sale October 22, 1823. Joseph Holman, of Wayne 
county, was the first receiver and Samuel Vance of Law- 
renceburg, register. The office was in the old fort.^ Dur- 
ing the decade from 1830 to 1840 this office was thronged 
with settlers who came up the Maumee, attracted by the 
opening of the Wabash and Erie canal. 

In 1828 the northwest quarter of the State was erected 
into the Crawfordsville District.^*^ Beginning about 1825 
a heavy immigration set into the Wabash country by emi- 
grants from the southern part of Indiana and elsewhere, 
coming up through the central part of the State. Such 
people found it inconvenient to go to Terre Haute. For 
this reason Dunn and Whitlock had held a land auction at 
Crawfordsville, beginning December 24, 1824.^1 Just 
when the office was permanently located at Crawfordsville 
does not appear, but it was prior to 1828. 

The last land office district to be laid off in Indiana was 
the LaPorte. It included the lands lying west of the east- 
ern boundaries of Kosciusko and Elkhart counties, and 
north of the parallel running through Delphi. i- The law 
providing for this office was passed March 2, 1833, but 
just when the office was opened does not appear. It was 
removed to Winamac during the summer of 1839.^3 

§ 65 Land Sales 

Excepting the lands reserved for school purposes, and 
those bordering salt springs and known as the "saline 

8 United States Statutefi at Large. 1822. ch. 126. 

9 Col. Robert S. Robertson, Valley of the Upper Maumee, I, 199. 

10 United States Statutes at Large, 1833. cb. 77, See. 10. 

11 Sanford Cox, Old Settlers, 17. 

12 United States Statutes at Large, 18,33, cb. 78, Sec. 10. 

13 Indiana Journal, November 15, 1839. 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 



345 







Land Surveys — State Geological Report, 1882. 



346 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

lands," all the lots in a district were offered at public 
auction. Due to the fact that a district's boundaries were 
frequently changed after an Indian treaty, there might be 
held more than one auction in a district. 

At the auction, which usually took place at the opening 
of the district, the various lots of land were cried and sold 
to the highest bidder, provided the bid was equal to or 
above the minimum price fixed by Congress. Three 
months' notice of auctions was given in a proclamation by 
the President. The lands were offered in whole, half, or 
quarter section lots. Smaller lots were sold if the buyer 
would pay the extra cost of surveying. The usual duration 
of the sale was three weeks, but after 1820 Congress re- 
duced the time to two weeks. 

The price fixed by Congress in 1800 was $2 per acre.^^ 
The purchaser was required to pay at the time of purchase 
$6 per section or $3 per half section to cover the cost of 
the survey, and he was also required to deposit one- 
twentieth of the purchase price. He then had forty days to 
pay the first installment which consisted of one-fourth of 
the purchase price. The last installments consisting of 
one-fourth each were due at the end of two, three, and 
four years. Six per cent interest was charged if pay- 
ments were not made on time, and eight per cent discount 
was allowed if money was paid before it was due. The 
government was a liberal creditor. Every favor possible 
was shown to the honest buyer. Under a later law the 
debtor was given scrip for what he had paid, if unable to 
complete his payments. When all payments were made 
the purchaser was given a patent. i"' 

The amount of money taken in at the land office was 
proverbial. January 1, 1815, the ofifice at Jeffersonville 
reported $242,176 outstanding, while Vincennes had $122,- 
723 out. By January 1, 1819, these debts by the land buy- 

14 The (jovei'umeut has steadily reduced the price of imblic lands. 
The following have been the prices: if2.r)0, $2.00. $1.25, $1.00. $.75. $.6(5%. 
$.50, $.25. $.12%, and gifts as a homestead. Thomas Donaldson, The 
Puhlw Domain, index. 

15 The Government lost about $20.0(X).000 out of $47,000,000 credited 
under the law of 1800. 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 347 

ers had increased to $1,021,834, and $1,390,909 respect- 
ively.^^ 

During the first year of our statehood the Jefferson- 
ville Land Office sold 261,142 acres for $522,285; Vin- 
cennes 325,361 acres for $601,302.1" The public land sales 
at Indianapolis were held in October, 1820, July and August, 
1821, and in September, 1822. There were sold 237,173 
acres at an average price of $1,441/2 per acre. The remain- 
der of this district, 570,227 acres, was sold between 1820 
and 1828 for the minimum price, which had been reduced 
at that time to $1.25 per acre.^"' The receiver at Fort 
Wayne wrote in July, 1836, that he was receiving $25,000 
per day. He expected to take in $1,500,000 during the 
season. Crawfordsville was doing even better ; in fact the 
latter office exceeded all the offices of the United States for 
several years in the amount of business done.^'* 

One of the serious problems of the land office was to 
get the money back to the government. After Jackson 
issued the Specie Circular nearly all the money received 
was in coin. From Ft. Wayne and Crawfordsville it was 
frequently transported in four-horse wagons, guarded by 
a score of armed men. 

The receivers were very careful as to the kind of money 
they received. Only such as could be deposited in the Bank 
of the United States as cash would be received. It was 
necessary for one who owed the land office to get this kind 
of money. This led to much inconvenience and positive 
wrong. At the old land office of Vincennes a bank was 
established where the customers could get their bank 
notes converted into land-office money. The bankers — in 
this case the receiver was president of the bank — 
charged from six to twelve per cent for this service. This 
business was called "note shaving." The money when re- 
ceived at the land office was deposited immediately in the 

^^ American State Papers; FiuatuT, III, 782. 
■ IT A'i/e.s' Register, XIII. 261. 
^8 Indiana Journal, July 19, 1834. 

'^^ RepuhJicnn and Banner, Julj- 20, 18.^6: Log:;iiisi»(iit Telegraph. 
June IS. 1836. 



348 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bank and again used for "note shaving." The office at In- 
dianapolis was kept over a store, the storekeeper doing the 
"note shaving" with money furnished by the receiver of 
the land office.-" 

The land offices were among the most lucrative public 
positions open to ambitious politicians. As a result there 
v/ere many cases of fraud and embezzlement, not to men- 
tion errors caused by ignorance. A general investigation 
of the land offices was begun in 1833. James B. Gardner, 
who inspected the offices in Indiana, found them in bad 
condition. He estimated that one-fifth of all the land cer- 
tificates issued was defective either through the laziness or 
ignorance of the register. 

Many of the receivers were speculating in land scrip. 
As mentioned above, if any one failed to pay in full for 
land, the land was taken back and the buyer was given 
scrip or due bills for money actually paid and this was 
subsequently received as cash in payment for other land. 
The receiver bought up this scrip at heavy discount and 
turned it in as cash. Speculators in the east bought it up 
and cashed it with dishonest receivers. A widely organ- 
ized ring of speculators was found among the congressmen 
and men in the General Land Office at Washington. It 
perhaps cost one Indiana senator his re-election. The 
agent at Indianapolis in 1833, in connection with a mer- 
chant of the toM^n, was doing an extensive business in 
scrip, of which the merchant, during the year 1833, had 
gathered up $98,000 worth. Not only was this turned into 
the land office at par but it was used by the merchant to 
"shave" money brought in by the buyers, which was not 
acceptable at the land office. A clerk in the store held a 
commission as notary public and was making large sums 
of money taking affidavits which were demanded on every 
pretense by the receiver who shared in the fees. The 
receiver had formed a partnership with a local broker and 
they were doing a profitable business speculating in lands 

-^ Ametican State Papers, Finance, V, 66; American State Papers, 
Public Lands, VII, 507; see also Lognn Esarey, EurJij Banldng in In- 
diana, 234. 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 349 

and cashing notes given by the land buyers. On these 
notes they got eight per cent discount. At the time of the 
investigation the receiver had $12,000 of government 
money so invested. The receiver had also loaned large sums 
of money to the merchants in Indianapolis. The United 
States attorney, who was a candidate for United States 
senator, found it very embarrassing politically to collect the 
debts due the land office on account of the large number of 
prominent persons who had borrowed money from the re- 
ceiver. 

At Crawfordsville the inspector found everything in an 
uproar. The office had been placed in the hands of Dr. 
I. T. Canby, the defeated candidate for governor in 1828. 
As soon as he arrived, he and his bondsmen began using 
the land office money to set themselves up in the mercantile 
business. In a short time Canby was a defaulter to the 
extent of $48,433. His bondsmen had entered 3,200 acres 
of first class land at the lowest price. Gen. Samuel Miiroy, 
one of his bondsmen, had taken over the office but had later 
turned it over to his son.-' 

Speculation in public lands did not play so important a 
part in Indiana as it had in Ohio. Many of the towns of 
the State, however, were opened up by speculators. There 
was complaint of speculators at the land sale at Indian- 
apolis, Jeffersonville, and especially at Fort Wayne. By 
1830 the speculator had come into such bad repute that he 
would not be tolerated at the sales. This was the case at 
Crawfordsville, LaPorte, and Winamac. Women who came 
to the sales to bid off their homesteads were not bid against. 
After the sales, speculators or their agents visited the land 
office and frequently bought up a great many tracts. One 
of their plans was to hunt up those persons who had pur- 

21 The details of tliis inve.sti^-itiou are giveu in American Slate 
Papers, Public Lundf;, VII. 560. The following defalcations were report- 
ed : Josepli Holman. Fort Wayne. $4,721, paid after suit: Charles 
■M. Taylor, Jeffersonville, $5,738, paid after suit ; Andrew P. Hay, 
Jeffersonville, $5,046, paid after suit ; J. C. S. Harrison. Yincennes, 
$9,253, giveu IS years to pay; Israel T. Canby, Crawfordsville, $46,433, 
paid by securities. The money at Indianapolis was secured by the bonds- 
men without suit and the office reported even. 



350 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

chased small tracts and buy the adjoining land. If the 
settler prospered he would soon want more land. If he 
failed the speculator would buy his tract at the government 
price and get the advantage of the improvements. In any 
case he would get the advantage of the rise of land without 
doing his part in developing the community. He paid very 
little tax, did not help build roads, raise houses, churches, 
schoolhouses, or roll logs. The speculator, the note shaver, 
and the horse thief were the most despised men on the 
frontier. -- 

The following table shows the amount of land sold in 
the years given and the money received. It gives one a 
good idea of the number of persons coming into the State 
every year, though of course not all buyers were immi- 
grants : 

1816 there were sold, 586.503 acres for $1,128..")S7 

1817-1822 were sold. acres for 2.108,336 

1822 there were sold. 252.982 acres for 329.066 

1823 there were sold, 165,046 acres for 211,157 

1824 there were sold. 154.558 acres for 187.508 

1825 there were sold, 162,270 acres for 210,248 

1826 there were sold, 200,190 acres for 250.238 

1827 there were sold. 209.691 acres for 263.063 

1828 there were sold, 250.812 acres for 313,517 

1829 there were sold. .346,527 acres for 435,571 

1830 there were sold, 476.351 acres for .598.115 

1831 there were sold. .554.436 acres for 694.863 

1832 there were sold. 546,844 acres for 684.209 

1833 there were sold. 5.54,681 acres for 693,.522-3 

The oflices had collected the following; anioiiiits up to the close of 

1835: 

Vincennes $2,317,657 

Jeffersonville 2,26.5,127 

Brookville & Indianapolis 2,153,875 

Terre Haute & Crawfordsville 2,315.689 

Fort Wayne 355,853 

LaPorte 102,040-'4 

The total area of the public land in Indiana was 21,637,- 
760 acres. Of this the State of Indiana received as a gift 

22 Sanford Cox. Old Settlers. 18; Col. Willi.uu M. Cockruni. A Pioneer 
History of IndhiiKi: Robert S. Robertson, \aUcii of the Upper Maumee, 
I, 198. 

-'^American titute rd/icrx. Pitblic Lmidx. \'l], .").•',(); see also Niles' 
Register, IX. 278. 

--^American t^tatc Papers. I'uhlic Laiids, VII, ."4;!. 



PUBLIC LANDS IN INDIANA 351 

23,040 acres of "Saline lands" ; 2,612,321 acres of "swamp 
lands" ; 650,317 acres for common schools ; 46,080 acres for 
the university; 1,457,366 acres for the Wabash and Erie 
canal; 2,560 acres for a capital site; 170,582 acres for the 
Michigan road.--^ 

25 Thomas Donaldson. The Public Domain, index; Public Lands, 
VI, 663; Purdue University received 212.238 acres, but none of it was 
in Indiana. 



CHAPTER XVI 

systematic internal improvements 

§ 66 The Problem, the People, and the Legislature 

Immediately after the War of 1812 there arose in all 
parts of the United States a demand for internal improve- 
ments constructed by the government. The rise of a politi- 
cal party favoring this policy is contemporaneous with the 
admission of Indiana into the Union. The party found its 
strength among the farmers, and was based on a legitimate 
economic need. The farmers throughout the State pos- 
sessed an abundance of fertile land. Their surplus prod- 
ucts were of little value to them, since a large part, and 
frequently all, of their profits were eaten up in transporta- 
tion. Their markets were the seaboard cities, and the far- 
ther west the farmer was, the less valuable was his sur- 
plus grain. Every State from New York south and west 
was busy from 1816 to 1840 developing and perfecting its 
own system. Legislators and legislatures were called wise 
just in proportion to the completeness and inclusiveness 
of their systems. Every State finally caught the fever, and 
in the two decades following the close of the War of 1812 
they rolled up a combined internal improvement debt ag- 
gregating $225,000,000.^ Pennsylvania took the lead in 
amount, while New York led in time and spirit, and was 
the only one to carry the policy to success. At the very 
time when the Indiana General Assembly was holding its 
first session, the future policy of the United States toward 
internal improvement was being decided. In the session 
of Congress, convened in 1816, a select committee,- ap- 

^ American Almanac and Repository of Useful KiunrJedge for the 
Year 1840. 105, Boston. 

2McM;ister, A History of the People of the United States. IV, 411. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 353 

pointed on motion of Calhoun, introduced a bill setting aside 
the bonus of $1,500,000, paid by the Second Bank of the 
United States, and the annual dividend on $7,000,000 of 
stock, owned by the United States, as a fund for building- 
roads and canals. This measure passed Congress by vir- 
tue of votes from the middle and western States, but it was 
vetoed by Madison. Three months after the first Indiana 
Assembly adjourned — April 15, 1817 — the legislature of 
New York undertook the construction of the Erie canal, 
and every resource of that State, from the income of lot- 
teries to the labor of her convicts, was pledged to its com- 
pletion. 

In his message to the General Assembly of December 
2, 1817, Governor Jennings of Indiana referred to a letter 
from DeWitt Clinton of New York, discussing the prac- 
ticability of connecting the Great Lakes with the Ohio- 
Mississippi system, thus making all-water connection be- 
tween the Hudson and Mississippi.^ In the same message, 
he notified the General Assembly of a resolution of the 
Pennsylvania legislature, inviting the governors of Ohio, 
Virginia, Kentucky, and Indiana to meet the governor of 
Pennsylvania in a conference on internal improvements, 
especially looking to the better navigation of the Ohio. 

Even then there were two parties in State politics that 
continued through the whole era to divide the counsels and 
energies of the young State. The settlers along the Ohio 
and Wabash rivers looked to New Orleans as the natural 
emporium; while all those settlers, and they were rapidly 
gaining the ascendency, who came over the National Road, 
looked to New York and the seaboard cities as the best 
markets. During the next ten years the "System" was the 
commonest subject of discussion. No one knew exactly 
what was meant by the "System," but it was felt that as 
soon as possible the State, by some means or other, would 
construct some kind of a system of communication that 
would answer the needs of the people. 

In response to memorials. Congress, May 26, 1824, do- 
nated to the State a strip of land 320 feet wide through the 

3 Rouse Jounwi. 1817. 8. 



354 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

public domain, on condition that the State, in twelve years, 
would construct a canal thereon. The committee on canals 
of the Indiana General Assembly reported the grant illib- 
eral, and moved another memorial.^ The governor urged 
in his message of 1825 that the grant be accepted at once 
and a further memorial sent to that body asking a section 
of land for each mile.'- This would easily build it. Thus 
a continuous waterway from New York to New Orleans 
would be opened across the country. The canal needed to 
be only twenty-eight miles long. Further, there was a great 
demand, continued the governor, for a canal from Law- 
renceburg to Fort Wayne. A company, in fact, was already 
surveying the route. A commissioner was then examining 
White river, and ere long two hundred miles of waterways 
would there be opened for navigation. Internal improve- 
ments were demanded by necessity and the spirit of the 
times. The State must have canals. 

The question of a canal at the portage between the Mau- 
mee and the Wabash rivers was an old one. Every statesman 
of this and the preceding period who was interested in the 
northwest had studied the problem of an all-water trade 
route between the seaboard and the Ohio valley. Washing- 
ton repeatedly discussed it ; and in a letter to his Secretary 
of War, Henry Knox, suggested the Maumee portage as the 
most feasible point of connection.'- The first definite in- 
formation was based on surveys and observations by Capt. 
James Riley, a United States surveyor. While surveying 
land for settlement he noted the ease with which the two 
rivers could be united. He reported to his superior, a re- 
port that soon found its way to Congress, that a canal six 
miles long would connect the St. Mary and Little rivers, 
from which navigation by the Maumee to Lake Erie and 
by the Wabash to the Ohio was easy. The swampy prairie 
through which the canal would run was reported to be so 
wet that no feeder would be required. This first observa- 
tion was made in 1818, and during the following season 

4 House Journal, 1825, 176. 

5 House Journal, 1825, 38. 
« Writings, IX. passim. 



ELKHART ^^ 



K05CIUSKO 



JASPeC 




r'""°"7f INDIANA I" 1636 



E.V.SIiOCKLEY 



iNTEBNAr Improvements. 



356 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

he raPx a line of levels. The canal, he thought, would need 
to be six miles in length. 

§ 67 The Wabash and Erie Canal 

The history of the canal system of Indiana begins in 
earnest with an act of Congress approved March 2, 1827." 
The party of Clay and Adams, driven from power in the na- 
tion, thus, on the eve of dissolution, bequeathed its princi- 
ples and its policy to the State of Indiana. This act granted 
to the State, for the purpose of aiding to build a canal, 
uniting at navigable points the waters of the Maumee and 
those of the Wabash, a strip of land one-half of five sec- 
tions wide, on either side of the canal, reserving alternate 
sections to be selected by a land commissioner under the 
direction of the President. In the preceding session of 
the Indiana Assembly the canal committee had reported a 
bill providing for a canal board and some surveys. This 
bill failed on account of the reluctance of the majority to 
raise taxes.'' Surveyor James Shriver was then surveying 
the Whitewater for a company organized to build a canal 
from Lawrenceburg to Fort Wayne." 

Meantime the settlers on the upper Wabash were clam- 
oring for aid. Produce could not be sold nor could they 
get goods from any place. Salt was hauled by ox teams 
from Michigan City at a cost of $12 per barrel, the trip 
requiring two weeks. In 1826 a corps of United States 
engineers, under the charge of Colonel Schriver, then at 
work on Whitewater, was sent to survey the portage at 
Fort Wayne. All were soon sick and Colonel Schriver died. 
Asa Moore continued the survey to Tippecanoe, and then 
do\vn the Maumee as far as the rapids, where he also died 
in his tent, October 4, 1828.i" 

On January 5, 1828, Indiana accepted the gift from the 
nation and committed the State to the building of the 
canal. 11 The act of acceptance provided for a board of 

7 United States Statutes at Larf/e. IV. 236. 

8 House Joxinial. 1826. 214. 

^ Governor's Message. House Journal. 1826. 46. 

If* Knapp. History of the Maumee Valley. .307. 

1^ /yfnr.s- of Iiuli'iud. 1827. cb. 7. See ;ilso .Joint liesolntion. eh. 08. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 357 

canal commissioners, to consist of three men. The commis- 
sioners were to select land, hire surveyors, locate the canal, 
make estimates, lay off town sites, and finance the under- 
taking, i- The sentiment of the State was strong for inter- 
nal improvements. All parties favored them. The country 
was delirious with internal improvement fever. 

Two of the canal commissioners, Burr and John, met 
on the call of Governor Ray at Indianapolis, July 17, 1828, 
organized, and proceeded to the Wabash; but on studying 
the law they found themselves without authority.^" A four 
years' war opened then in the State Assembly, fought on 
the floor in session and in the newspapers out of session. 
The lowest estimates on t?ie canal called for an expenditure 
of $991,000. The White VN^ater members cared little for the 
Wabash and hung back for a deal. The Ohio river group 
opposed openly and stoutly. The speaker, Ross Smiley of 
Union county, favored railroads. Governor Ray also fa- 
vored railroads because of less cost. The group that favored 
the canal, called the "Wabash Band," lacked unity. Mut- 
terings of discontent over high taxes reached all parts of 
Indiana from the people of Ohio, who were building a sys- 
tem of canals. Added to this, there was no definite knowl- 
edge furnished by engineers. The settlers on the Wabash 
were impatient lest the State let the land-grant forfeit. 
The members from the south opposed, because the State 
had lost some money on the Ohio Falls canal. The canal 
committee of the General Assembly of 1828, headed by 
Samuel Judah of Vincennes, made a lengthy report in favor 
of canals, and again introduced a bill looking toward con- 
struction, and again the General Assembly turned them 
down. Some opposed it because they did not think it nec- 

1- This board consisted of Saiimel Haiiua, of Fort Wayne: Kobert 
John, of Franklin county, and David Burr, of Jaclisou county. The 
board did nothing more than investigate and report to the next Assem- 
bly. The Assembly seemingly had gone as far as it could. When it 
came to expending money, there was a deadlock. The tax levy of the 
previous year had nettetl $33,000, which barely covered expenses. See 
Goveraor's Message, December 4, 1S27. The annual message of the 
Governor may be found in either the House, Semite, or Documentary 
Journal. 

13 Indianapolis Gazette. 

(24) 



358 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

essary, others because they wanted more definite informa- 
tion; while a large third party would not run the State 
into debt for something not absolutely needed. 

When the surveys commenced, an unexpected trouble 
arose. Navigable points on the two rivers could not be 
united without building part of the canal in Ohio. This 
Indiana could not do. Accordingly, Ohio appointed Willis 
Silliman its agent to confer with Jeremiah Sullivan with 
like power from Indiana. The men met in Cincinnati, Oc- 
tober 3, 1829, and agreed that Ohio should take a part of 
the land grant and dig that part of the canal within her 
boundary. ^^ 

During the following October land sales began at 
Logansport and Lafayette. The tracts were put up at auc- 
tion and spirited competition was shown. The prices, how- 
ever, were a disappointment. The highest prices at Logans- 
port were $4.06 per acre; lowest, $1.25; average, $1.75. 
From Lafayette came better reports, lots selling as high 
as $6 to $9 per acre. Two hundred and thirty-four thou- 
sand acres had been offered and 41,000 sold in 547 tracts 
or lots. There were no speculators buying. 

The people grew more impatient to see digging begin, 
but the railroad party, under the lead of David Hoover of 
Wayne county, was strong enough to block the General As- 
sembly for a whole session. The supplemental acts of 1832 
put the project on its feet.^"' Surveyor Joseph Ridgeway 

14 Western Sun, January 9. 1830. 

1"' Lairi< of Indiana, 1831. ch. 1, 108. We are apt to judge the leaders 
of this iieriod hastily and accuse them of losing their heads. They 
did make a gigantic mistake, but there are some mitigating conditions. 
This venture was considered, and held before the public, ten years 
before work w.is commenced. Then it was undertaken only in despair 
of any better means of reaching a market with their produce. A bushel 
of corn at Indiana])olis was worth 12 to 20 cents. On the river board it 
was worth 50 cents. An ordinary acre of farm land would produce 
sixty bushels — a loss on each acre, due to lack of transportation 
facilities of $18. The loss on one hundred acres was $1.8(M) annually. 
The State had within its boundaries millions of such acres whose 
value and usefulness to the State depended on commercial com- 
munication with the world. Now the nation was offering to donate 
land worth .$1,000,000 toward a canal whose estimated cost was only 
$1,100,000, and vest the title in the State. The proposed canal, however, 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 359 

had prepared final estimates that the canal complete would 
cost $1,081,970. A canal fund was constituted and placed 
in charge of three commissioners, known as fund commis- 
sioners. Money was to be borrowed at six per cent, pledg- 
ing land, tolls, and the faith of the State. Lands were 
placed in three classes : The first, to sell at $3.50 ; second, 
at $2.50; third, at $1.50; and the canal board was to open 
sales again in October, 1832. Work was ordered com- 
menced on the canal before March 2, 1832. The canal 
board began letting contracts March 1, 1832. The canal 
was divided into sections about one-half mile long, for 
which the engineers had made full plans and specifications, 
and then each section was let to the lowest bidder. During 
the first year thirty-eight contracts were made, covering 
about twenty miles, and calling for $117,000 in payment. 
The canal board hired Jesse L. Williams to do its work of 
supervising construction. The opposition to the canal 
gradually melted away till 1834, when there was no active 
trace of it left. It was then accepted as the settled policy 
of the State. The question with each locality was no 
longer, how can we oppose the Wabash and Erie, but how 
can we get a canal for our own county or neighborhood. ^^ 

Meanwhile the Wabash and Erie crept steadily west- 
ward from Fort Wayne to the mouth of the Tippecanoe, 
which was considered the head of navigation for the Wa- 
bash. The long line of huts resembled barracks to a forti- 
fied camp; and, if reports are true, the line resembled a 
camp in another very real way. The diggers were all Irish, 
and about equally divided between "Corkers" and "Way 
Downers" from Kerry. Members of the different bands 
never met without a fight.^" On one occasion four hundred 

was far to the north of the settled portion of the State, aud could 
never benetit nine-tenths of the people who were to build it. And it 
was only on the tacit agi'eeruent that it was to be the first of a system, 
reaching all parts of the State, that it was undertaken. It is not the 
undertaking, but the business method that comes in for most censure. 
There were too many commissioners, engineers, staff officers, land 
agents, paymasters, finance agents in New York, Baltimore and Boston. 

16 See Judge David Kilgore's Speech in Constitutional Convention of 
1850. Debates, index. 

17 Helm, History of Wahash County, 68. 



360 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

militia were required to stop an impending battle near 
Lagro, in which four hundred Corkers had armed them- 
selves and were moving up the line to clean out their ene- 
mies J ^ The board reported that about 1,000 men had 
worked on the canal during the summer of 1834. 

After a careful examination of the Wabash river, the 
commissioners decided that Lafayette should be its southern 
terminus, and they had already assumed authority to make 
preliminary surveys. The canal had cost, thus far, $729,- 
000, and to go down to Lafayette, which, they said, was the 
great steamboat landing and commercial center of that 
region, would cost nearly $100,000 more. The General As- 
sembly in 1834 ordered the extension, the canal to cross 
the Wabash at Ballard's bluff in the pool of a dam. At 
the Birmingham bluff the canal was to be built out in the 
river and protected by brush rip-rap.^" By the fourth of 
July, 1835, boats were running on the section west of Fort 
Wayne, but the tolls were not enough to keep it in repair. 
Already the wooden aqueducts were rotten. The State 
finally finished the line, and on July 4, 1843, it was opened 
from Lafayette to Toledo. The event was fitly celebrated 
in an oration at Fort Wayne by Gen. Lewis Cass. 

§ 68 The System of 1836 

The opposition to State internal improvement disap- 
peared with the beginning of active work on the canal. The 
mania rapidly gathered headway after 1830. The time of 
the General Assembly was almost entirely taken with such 
schemes. Reports from all canals built in the east were 
flattering.-" The Indiana legislature of 1832 incorporated 
no less than a dozen joint stock companies to build various 
lines of railroads. These included roads from Lawrenceburg 
to Indianapolis ; from Madison via Indianapolis to Lafayette ; 
from Jeffersonville via Salem, Bloomington, Greencastle to 
Lafayette; from Harrison to Indianapolis via Greensburg 
and Shelbyville; from Lafayette to Lake Michigan; from 

iS jjoGumentary Journal, 1835, IS. 

19 General Laivs of hidiano. is:!4. eh. IC. 

20 iVj7es' Rcfflster. December 1. IS'jri. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 361 

Jeffersonville via Columbus, Indianapolis, and due north to 
the Wabash. These were not the idle dreams of irrespon- 
sible adventurers, but on their charters are the names of 
the best men of the State. 

The years during the presidency of Adams and Jackson 
were an era of great commercial prosperity in the United 
States. Every resource was being developed to its utmost. 
Transportation facilities fell far behind the capacity for 
production. Seaboard prices remained high and steady. 
Every section was studying the same problem — how to get 
to market. New York had finished her great canal, but 
was eager for a waterway from the Lakes to the Mississippi 
Valley. As a result of this work, New York City was rap- 
idly running away from Baltimore and Philadelphia in 
wealth and population. Pennsylvania was spending vast 
money to get a canal or railroad through from Philadel- 
phia to Pittsburgh on the Ohio. Baltimore, in conjunction 
with Maryland and Virginia, was building a canal and a 
railroad from the Potomac to the Ohio along the old Brad- 
dock route. Ohio had taken the suggestion of New York, 
and had almost completed two magnificent canals from 
Lake Erie to the Ohio. The echo of all this activity was 
caught up in the newspapers of Indiana, and her farmers, 
already producing two and three times as much as could 
be consumed, read them eagerly. Borrow money was the 
argument, and build canals.-^ 

Still, with the sentiment of the State overwhelming for 
the system, there was a serious political problem to be 
solved. All realized that there must be some limit to the 
number of works undertaken. The "Wabash band" were 
interested in a first-class canal to Lafayette, and a naviga- 
ble Wabash from there to the Ohio. The Whitewater mem- 
bers — the strongest of the interests — were sure of their po- 
sition, but wished to hold the State to as few lines as 
possible so as to insure a rapid prosecution of the White- 
water canal. In the absence of well-organized and disci- 

21 Governor Noah Noble's Message, House Journal, 1834, 12. See 
further House Journal, 18.35, 12, where the same idea is advanced more 
boldly. 



362 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

plined parties, the project was not so easily carried as 
planned. The session of 1834-35 was spent in vainly try- 
ing to organize the Assembly on this basis. As finally or- 
ganized, this party controlled every county in the State but 
seven — Harrison, Posey, Crawford, Switzerland, Hendricks, 
Perry, and Spencer — and six of these were on the Ohio.-- 

The Whitewater canal was the starting point in all these 
discussions.-^ The settlers in the valley, the most populous 
district of the State, as early as 1832 had petitioned for a 
canal. The Assembly of 1833 ordered a preliminary sur- 
vey, a report of which by Surveyor Gooding was laid be- 
fore the Assembly December 23, 1834.-4 The valley was 
reported to be shallow and the fall excessive, requiring a 
great number of locks. There were many washed banks 
where the canal would have to be built over the river. The 
survey began at Nettle creek near Cambridge City in 
Wayne county, close to the crossing of the old National 
Road. Thence it passed down the west bank to Somerset 
at the Franklin county line, where it crossed, recrossing 
again at Brookville and following the west bank to the 
Ohio at Lawrenceburg. The length was seventy-six miles, 
seven dams were necessary, fifty-six locks, and 491 feet of 
lockage. The estimated cost was $1,142,126. 

It would give an outlet for Franklin, Rush, Fayette, 
Henry, Randolph, and Hancock counties, as well as a large 
part of Wayne, Union, Decatur, and Delaware — a district 
aggregating 3,150 square miles. Produce could be trans- 
ported by this means at an average cost of $3.56 per ton 
as against $10, the present cost. This would save $221,000 
for the section each year. The water power would turn 
318 pairs of millstones. This argument is given in some 
detail to show the nature of the discussions that occupied 
the General Assembly and the newspapers during the dec- 
ade from 1830 to 1840.-^ 

22 Documentary Journal, 1836. No. 5. 

23 For :m excellent description of how this hiw was carried, see 
speech by Judge Kilgore, Debates in Constitutional Convention, 1850, 
index. 

24 House Journal, 1834, 255. 

25 House Journal. 344. This is a good summary of the argument for 
and against canals as they viewed them at that time. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 363 

The time of the session of 1834 was taken by the As- 
sembly in framing a bill for a general system of improve- 
ments. It developed into a game of legislative seesaw with 
the Whitewater canal as its center. Every member was 
willing to vote for the latter provided his own county was 
not neglected. No system could be determined which it 
was thought the State could build. When the Assembly of 
1835 met, it at once went to work on the unfinished bill. 
The only fight left over was on the route from Vincennes 
to New Albany. The influence of the lobby prevailed, how- 
ever, and it was included. 

As a study of the political activity of the times the agi- 
tation for this road is worth noting. The movement was 
started by a letter signed "Knox" in the Western Sun in 
the early summer of 1835. Acting on the suggestion, the 
citizens of Daviess county met in mass meeting at the 
courthouse in Washington October 5, and appointed dele- 
gates to meet similarly appointed delegates from all other 
counties interested, at Paoli October 26, to deliberate on 
the affair of a turnpike road.-^'- After due discussion it 
was decided to send a lobby to the General Assembly, con- 
sisting of one man from each county. It was further de- 
cided to work for a macadam road. Petitions were pre- 
pared to be circulated in each county, and a committee of 
twenty appointed to present this united petition.-' The 
agitation that backed each route provided by the pending 
bill was similar to the above, though usually stronger and 
more insistent. 

On January 27, 1836, Governor Noah Noble signed the 
Mammoth Internal Improvement Bill.-'^ Taken in all its 
aspects, its consequences immediate and remote, it was the 
most important measure ever signed by an Indiana gov- 
ernor. It carried appropriations aggregating $13,000,000, 
or one-sixth of the wealth of the State at that time, fixing 
the policy and mortgaging the resources of the State for 
half a century. The act provided that the governor, by 

26 Western Sun, October 10, 183.^. 

27 iMd., October 31. 1.8.35. 

28 General Laws of Indiana, 1835, ch. 2. 



364 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

and with the consent of the senate, should appoint six men 
to act with the canal board already appointed. These men 
were to serve three years, except that one-third of the first 
appointees were to serve one year, one-third two years. The 
governor in making appointments was to have regard to 
local situations so that one member should be near each 
work. This board was to locate and superintend the works 
provided for, meet semi-annually, and make a detailed re- 
port to the General Assembly every session. Aside from 
necessary expenses, each member was to receive $2 for 
every day actually and necessarily employed. This board 
was to take such measures as were necessary to commence, 
construct, and complete the following works: 

1. The Whitewater Canal over the route formerly des- 
ignated. Also a canal to connect the Whitewater with the 
Central, from some point near the National Road to some 
point in Madison or Delaware county if possible ; if a canal 
could not be built, then connect them by a railroad. For 
these the sum of $1,400,000 was appropriated. 

2. The Central Canal, commencing at the most suitable 
point on the Wabash between Fort Wayne and Logansport, 
via Muncietown, to Indianapolis, down White river to the 
forks ; thence by the best route to Evansville. Provided : 
The board may select the Pipe Creek route and build a 
feeder to Muncie if thought best. Appropriation $3,500,000. 

3. An extension of the Wabash and Erie Canal from 
Tippecanoe river down to Terre Haute, thence by Eel river 
to the Central ; or, if the board think best, strike the Cen- 
tral at the mouth of Black creek, in Knox county. Ap- 
propriation $1,300,000. 

4. A railroad from Madison, through Columbus, In- 
dianapolis, to Lafayette. Appropriation, $1,300,000. 

5. A macadamized turnpike from New Albany, through 
Greenville, Fredericksburg, Paoli, Mt. Pleasant, Washing- 
ton, to Vincennes; $1,150,000 appropriated. 

6. A resurvey of the route from Jeffersonville via New 
Albany, Salem, Bedford, Bloomington, Greencastle, to 
Crawfordsville, to be made before next October. If it be 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 365 

found practicable, construct a railroad, if not a macadam- 
ized road; for which $1,300,000 was appropriated. 

7. Fifty thousand dollars was set aside for removing 
the obstructions in the Wabash. 

8. A survey of a canal if possible, if not, a railroad, 
from the Wabash and Erie near Fort Wayne, via Goshen, 
South Bend, Laporte, to the lake at Michigan City. This 
was to be commenced within ten years. 

A general fund was provided, to consist of all 
moneys raised from sale of State bonds, from loans, grants, 
profits, appropriations, tolls, and rents. The fund commis- 
sioners were authorized to borrow $10,000,000 on twenty- 
five years' time, at six per cent. For the payment of this 
loan, principal and interest, there were pledged, the canals, 
railroads, turnpikes, all grounds, rents, tolls, and profits, 
to the sufificiency of which there was pledged the faith of 
the State. The right of eminent domain was given the 
board, and it was authorized to purchase for the State any 
lands made especially valuable by the works ; though no 
member could buy land for himself within one mile of a 
canal. The Indianapolis and Lawrenceburg railroad was 
given the right to borrow $500,000 on the credit of the 
State, giving by v/ay of security to the State a mortgage 
on wild lands. Finally, the State pledged itself to build 
each and all lines with all haste possible. 

The news of the passage of the bill was received with 
every demonstration of joy. Illuminations, addresses, and 
bonfires were the order in every city and town from Evans- 
ville to Fort Wayne. Not only in Indiana, but from Bos- 
ton to New Orleans, the enterprise and spirit of the young 
State were applauded. The immediate effect of the meas- 
ure was to boom every town on the line and cause many 
new ones to spring up — on paper. Thousands of town lots 
were thrown on the market at the ridiculously low prices 
of $50 to $200 each ; although the land, in many cases, had 
been bought within the year for $3 per acre. 



366 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

§ 69 Construction of Canals and Roads 

Pursuant to the act, Governor Noble appointed Samuel 
Hall, of Gibson ; Thomas H. Blake, of Vigo ; David H. Max- 
well, of Monroe; John G. Clendennin, of Orange; John 
Woodburn, of Jefferson ; and Eliza Long, of Wayne county, 
as the six new members of the board of internal improve- 
ments. The board met at Indianapolis March 7, 1836, with 
all present but Judge Hall. Maxwell was chosen chairman 
unanimously. The board appointed Jesse L. Williams en- 
gineer, and requested the fund commissioners to place a 
loan of $2,000,000. After deciding what sections should 
be put under contract, the work was distributed so that 
each member had the work nearest his home under his 
supervision.-'-' 

The meeting was anything but harmonious. The scram- 
ble for the lion's share of the money began as soon as the 
first meeting was called to order. Each commissioner 
seemed to be interested alone in getting his work completed 
as soon as possible. An engineer in chief for canals and 
an engineer in chief for railroads were hired in addition 
to a resident engineer, and full corps of surveyors for each 
line.-'" The total number of these latter, many of whose 
positions were sinecures, was about seventy-five, at an av- 
erage annual expense to the State of $54,000. This body of 
workmen was popularly known as the "Eating Brigade."-' 

After deciding on the general policy of putting only 
those lines under contract that would soonest yield a reve- 
nue, the board ordered work to be commenced as follows: 
Whitewater, from Lawrenceburg to Brookville, the home 
of Mr. Long; twenty-two miles of Madison railroad, out of 

29 Annual Report, Documcntanj JournaJ. 1836. 

30 They appointed as resident enjiineers: Chief, .Jesse L. Williams; 
for roads, Henry M. Pettit: eastern end of Wab.'.sh and Erie, Stearns 
Fisher; central part of Wabash and Erie, L. B. Wilson: western part, 
Anderson Davis; Whitewater. Simpson Torbert : Indianapolis line, 
T. A. Morris; Evansville line. C. G. Voorhies; Cross Cut, W. I. Ball; 
Fall Creek and Erie and Michigan, Solomon Holman ; .Teffersonville and 
Crawfordsville. R. H. Fauntleroy; Madison railroad, E. M. Beckwith; 
New Albany, Vineennes line, John Eraser. 

31 John Dumont, in Recollections of Early Settlements of Carroll 
County, 152. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 367 

Madison; the Wabash and Erie, west to Lafayette; the 
Cross-Cut Canal, from Terre Haute to Eel river; the Cen- 
tral Canal, along Pigeon creek to Evansville; bridges and 
grading on Vincennes-New Albany turnpike; Central 
Canal from the feeder above Indianapolis to Port Royal 
Bluffs; and twenty miles of the Jeffersonville and Craw- 
fordsville road. This policy had nothing to back it but the 
selfish greed of the members of the board. 

Work had scarcely begun before a hampering criticism 
of everything connected with improvements was com- 
menced by the people and the legislature.^^ 

A powerful party in the legislature insisted on "classi- 
fication" — building a single line at a time — but no two sec- 
tions could unite on what line to build first. The first an- 
nual report of the board prophesied plainly the final fail- 
ure of the system. After reciting that "The system sprung 
from the reciprocal confidence, harmonious understanding 
and cooperation of the different sections," the board re- 
ported that scarcity of labor had prevented them from plac- 
ing many contracts. The contractors in different sections 
were bidding against each other for laborers and attempt- 
ing to lure away by extra inducements the better hands."^ 
The people, once the digging was begun, and they saw the 
many weary years necessary to complete the work, soon 
awoke from the trance of the canal orator. The land policy 
of the State and nation, by allowing any one to buy land 
for a trifle on seventeen years' credit, drew the more enter- 
prising men away from labor on the works. Above all, 
the character of the improvements to be made on several 
lines was still unsettled. Should they build a pike or a 
railroad on the Madison line? If a railroad, a single or a 
double track? Should the New Albany-Greencastle line be 
a pike, railroad or macadam? A special surveyor was or- 
dered, who spent one year on the latter line, and still there 
was uncertainty. The same question hung over the Vin- 
cennes-New Albany line. A large party was at work in 
the woods and swamps of the northern part of the State 

32 Western Sun, J.iuuary 2, 18.86. 

33 Documentunj Journal, 1837. 



368 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

trying to settle the question of canal or railroad from Fort 
Wayne to Lake Michigan, The same question was yet to 
be solved on the connecting line from Richmond to Muncie.^^ 

Illinois and Michigan were engaged in similar systems 
and drawing heavily on the labor supply, as well as flood- 
ing eastern markets with bonds. The "System" orators 
had not only promised there would be no higher taxation, 
but that soon there would no need of a State levy at all, 
as tolls would pay all. Consequently the General Assembly 
made no provision for interest. During the first year ex- 
penses mounted up to millions ($3,827,000), and the inter- 
est had to be paid from loans.^"^ But Governor Wallace as- 
sured everybody that the outlook was glorious, plenty of 
money among the people, although eastern banks were fail- 
ing. During the year 1837 over $1,500,000 was expended, 
not including $34,000 for surveyors, or $70,000 for officers' 
expenses. Ten separate routes had been surveyed and 
ninety-eight surveyors were continually in the woods. 
During the year 1838, $1,693,000 was spent for digging, 
with usual incidentals, not including $170,000 for interest, 
which put the total near $2,000,000.3" On January 24, 
1839; Caleb Smith, the fund commissioner, reported that 
he had expended $5,000,000. 

Governor Wallace, in his message of December 4, 
1838, draws a distressing picture. The interest then due 
was $193,350, the revenue of the State was $45,000 from 
taxation, from total taxable property of $146,850,000. "If 
this condition," said the governor, "does not startle us, it 
should at least awaken us." The governor assured the 
General Assembly, though, that if it would borrow money 
and invest in bank stock, the State would realize enough 
to pay out. 

The opponents of the improvement system gradually 
got the attention of the State. The question of reorganiza- 
tion and classification was raised in 1838, but without re- 
sult. The next General Assembly abolished the whole 

3^ Engineers' Report, Docutnentanj Journal, 1837 (not paged) 
35 Report of Board, Doenmcntary Journal, 1837. 
^^Documentary Journal, 1838, No. 22. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 369 

organization and placed the financial affairs in the hands 
of two men, each under $100,000 bond.^' The internal im- 
provement board was reduced to three members, with or- 
ders to classify works and build one at a time. But the act 
came too late. The State was a bankrupt beyond the power 
of any remedial law. 

The system finally broke down in August, 1839, when 
the board ordered all work to cease. The State at this 
time seemed to recover consciousness, and began to take 
stock of its condition. 

The work on the Whitewater Canal had commenced 
first. A big celebration at Brookville September 13, 1836, 
at which David Wallace, Governor Noble and Ex-Governor 
Ray were the orators, ushered in the undertaking. •='' The 
work was always pushed more than any other, on account 
of the great bulk of the population of the State being in that 
valley. Nine hundred and seventy-five men were employed, 
and the manager was sure the same force would finish the 
work in two seasons. December 20, 1838, Superintendent 
Long reported the canal well-nigh complete to Brookville.''"' 
This line was practically finished when the failure of the 
State required a cessation of work, notice of which was 
given by Noah Noble, president of the board, August 18, 
1839.^" In June of this same year, boats had been run as 
far up as Brookville. 

It will be noticed that the original appropriation for 
the 116 miles was $1,400,000, the original estimate $1,700,- 
000, and the final estimates over $2,000,000. During its 
first six months of operation $670 in tolls was collected. 
During this same period the gross receipts on the Wabash 
and Erie were $4,284 — enough to pay interest on about 
$70,000, and not nearly enough for repair expenses. 

Pursuant to the law of 1834, J. L. Williams surveyed 
the route for the Central Canal in the summer of 1835. The 
plans called for a cut forty feet wide at the surface of the 

37 Latvs of Indiana, 1S38, ch. 16. 

38 History of Dearborn and Ohio Counties, index. 

39 Senate Journal, 18.38. 2r.6. 

40 Senate Journal, 1839, 144. 



370 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

water, twenty-six feet at the bottom, and four feet deep. 
Six different locations were made. The surveys show the 
hesitancy and lack of knowledge that hindered all the 
works. During all the summer of 1836 surveying contin- 
ued along the line. The Indianapolis division was laid off 
from the dam at Broad Ripple to Port Royal Bluff, twenty- 
four miles. Also the southern division along Pigeon creek 
in Vanderburg county, and the Cross Cut at Eel river 
from Terre Haute to Point Commerce, were laid down. 

During 1836-37, forty-five miles were put under con- 
tract at $611,336. Seven hundred and fifty men were at 
work on the Indianapolis division. When work was sus- 
pended by the State, eight miles of the section from In- 
dianapolis to Muncie were finished, sixteen miles immedi- 
ately south of the capital, and nineteen miles on Pigeon 
creek. These sections, together with the Cross Cut, no 
part of which was ready to have water turned in, had cost 
the State $1,820,026. A humorous predicament of the 
Pigeon Creek section was that, when it was finished. Pigeon 
creek, which was supposed to feed it, was dry.^^ 

By the close of 1841 the State had expended $156,323 
on the line from Fort Wayne to Lake Michigan, for which 
they had nothing to show but a wagon load of surveyors' 
field notes. 

The Vincennes-New Albany route was surveyed during 
the summer of 1834 by Collins & Watt.^- The length was 
105 miles and the grading was estimated at $4,300 per 
mile; ballasting, $10,878; total cost of line, $1,590,747. 
Work commenced promptly and $654,411 was expended. 
The road was built as far west as Paoli, forty-one miles, 
and twenty-seven miles more were graded. This work 
proved of considerable local benefit, and under such super- 
intendents as John Frazier, 1844-47, Michael Riley, 1848, 
and Joel Vandeveer, 1850, enough tolls were collected to 

41 Senate Journal. 1S41. 13. See Dncumentarn Jonrnal, 1835, No. 
8, Report of Engineer. 

^- Documentarii Journal. 1835, or Senate Journal. 1835. 213. The 
surveyors hnd just graduated that year from Indiana College. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 371 

keep it in tolerable condition. ^'= It never paid a dollar of 
revenue to the State. 

Among the routes ordered surveyed by the Assembly of 
1834 was the New Albany-Crawfordsville route, and there- 
after the State confined its efforts in this section to this 
line — from New Albany, via Salem, Bedford, Bloomington 
and Greencastle, to Crawfordsville. Howard Stansbury 
was in charge of the preliminary survey.^^ The actual 
work was done by Edward Watts, John P. Paul and Fitz- 
hugh Coyle. The line was 158 miles long and the total 
cost of "graduation" estimated at $628,581. This meant 
only an ordinary dirt road. During the summer of 1838, 
Surveyor Fontleroy was hired to survey the road with a 
view to building a railroad, which Commissioner Maxwell 
favored. The report was favorable, but the improvement 
board was not satisfied and ordered Jesse Williams, aided 
by expert railroad engineers, Forrer from Ohio and Welch 
from Kentucky, to resurvey. 

These men reported that a macadam road would cost 
about $2,000,000, and a railroad about $7,000,000.^-' The 
controversy was finally ended by an act of the General 
Assembly, January 25, 1838, which directed the board to 
build a macadam road.^^ Work was not pushed on this 
line as on the others. Superintendent Maxwell seems to 
have had no faith in it. When work was suspended he 
had expended only $372,733 and had partly graded the 
sections from Salem south and from Greencastle north. 
Most of the money went to surveyors. Four different 
squads had spent as many seasons on it, and had agreed 
on nothing. The evidence seems to indicate that hunting 
and fishing were more congenial than surveying. Of all 
improvements of the State this line was conducted with 
least hopes of success. 

As has been stated above, there was a great rush for 
railroad charters during the years 1831-'32-'33. The be- 

43 Reports are foiuid in Indiana Pamphlets, vol. 2. Nos. 4 to 14, 
inclusive. 

^'i Documentary Journal, 1835, No. 11, or Senate Journals, 1835, 115. 

45 Documentary Journal, 1837, No. 19. 

46 Revised Statutes, 1838, 354. 



372 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

lief was general that the problem of travel and transpor- 
tation had been solved. Long lines such as the Buffalo 
and Mississippi and the Charleston, Cincinnati and Chi- 
cago were projected. The plans were discussed in inter- 
state railroad conventions. At this time a charter was 
obtained for the road from Madison to Lafayette. During 
the years 1834-'35-'36 there was a reversal in public opin- 
ion, and a railroad came to be regarded as practicable only 
when a canal or pike was impossible. 

During the summer of 1835 Mr. Gooding surveyed for 
the State a line for a canal from Indianapolis to Jefferson- 
ville.^''' One object of this canal was to furnish a way 
around the Falls, since it was to have two outlets — one 
above and one below. There were many obstacles to the 
construction, but Mr. Gooding finally found a feasible route 
and estimated the cost at $3,580,000. The cost staggered 
even that credulous General Assembly and they gave up 
this line with the consolation, however, that it would soon 
be built. 

In the meantime, Edwin Schenck had finished a survey 
for the Madison railroad. On this road he estimated that 
a four and one-half ton locomotive could draw thirty-six 
tons six miles per hour; or one horse, three and one-half 
tons, five miles. It was not decided what motor power 
would be used. Covered vv'ooden bridges were called for 
in the plans. Flat rails from Liverpool were estimated at 
$49 per ton, edge rails at $59. The bluff at Madison was 
to be climbed on an incline by means of a windlass. The 
length of the road was 144 miles, and the first estimates 
of cost were $1,666,797. 

Mr. Williams, chief engineer for the State, during the 
seasons of 1836-'37 kept a squad of surveyors on the line 
from Madison to Lafayette, and on January 30, 1838, after 
the State had spent $445,000, advised the legislature to 
abandon the railroad and build a pike.^'^ When work was 
stopped on the road, twentj^-eight and one-half miles were 
completed at a cost of $1,493,013. The northern end had 

4T t<rn(ttc JoHnial. ISo.j. ISlt. nlso Docuiiiciitdii/ JaiiriHil. 1835, No. 12. 
'i^ Doci(M('ni)(ru ./oiinial. is:]". Xo. 21. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 373 

been converted into a pike, and the section from Crawfords- 
ville to Lafayette was graded. 

Under the law of 1831 a board of three fund commis- 
sioners was appointed, whose duty was to borrow money to 
build the Wabash and Erie Canal. ^'^ This board continued 
under the law of 183 6. The business of the board was 
very poorly managed from the start and finally bankrupted 
the State. During the summer of 1832, $100,000 worth of 
State bonds were delivered to J. D. Beers & Company, 
Merchants' Bank of New York, on an unfair bid."'*^ One- 
half of these were sold on credit, thus tv/ice violating the 
law. This is only an example of how all the loans were 
placed. No books were kept, although the board kept an 
office in New York. The annual reports of the board of 
fund commissioners are not complete or consistent, and 
little reliance can be placed on them. The State gov- 
ernment paid little attention to the board until money be- 
gan to fail. It seems that bonds were signed and delivered 
to the several members of the board to sell as best each 
could. 

When work was stopped on the State's improvements 
in August, 1839, the people at first refused to believe that 
the State had failed. The business of the State had come 
to depend so heavily on the money furnished by the fund 
commissioners that it was paralyzed."' ^ Hundreds of con- 
tractors had put all their money into the work and now 
found themselves unable to pay the laborers whose living 
depended on their daily wages. The fund commissioners 
reported that money would soon be plentiful, but once the 
work was stopped the people soon came to recognize their 
condition."'- It was useless to propose any plan for com- 
pleting the system. When it was learned that State bonds 
to exceed $3,000,000 had been delivered, for which the 
State received nothing, and that the fund commissioners 
were charged with making immense sums of money by 

49 Laidi of liuUdiKi, 1831, ch. 1. sec. 3. 
^^ Documentdri/ Journal, 1835, No. 10. 
51^ Indiana iKtIi.s Journal, M.-ireh 12. 1840. 
5^ Western Sun, An.c.ist 31. 183n. 

(25) 



374 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

dealing in State securities, the people began to demand an 
investigation. 

The election of 1839 was over before the panic struck 
the State, and the General Assembly stood as undecided 
under the conditions as did the people. But, taking up 
the murmur of the people, the General Assembly, one of 
very limited ability, and well suited to the clique then rob- 
bing the State, attempted an inquest on the defunct sys- 
tem. •"'•^ The House called for no less than seventeen formal 
reports and was completely bewildered by them. Eighteen 
reports were made to the Senate by the internal improve- 
ment officials. The members, through a long session of 
eighty-five days, discussed petty politics while the stealing- 
continued under their eyes. The patience of the outraged 
people was exhausted. Before this deadlock Assembly had 
adjourned both parties were fencing for position for the 
contest of 1840. This was the most desperately contested 
political campaign ever wagfed in Indiana. Both parties 
were well supplied with good speakers. For near six weeks 
these men went up and down the State, 

Meanwhile the financial outlook of the State grew 
darker.'''^ Rothschields were demanding interest on their 
bonds, and contractors with claims, for work done, of over 
$1,000,000 were petitioning for relief. There was a strong 
party demanding that State scrip be issued to complete the 
system. •"•"" The General Assembly finally passed an act, 
January 13, 1840, for their relief, which provided for an. 
issue of $1,200,000 in treasury notes to pay contractors. 
Ex-Governor Noble had been placed on the reorganized 
board of improvements and was vainly trying to disen- 
tangle its business. The State debt was reported by the 
State Treasurer, Mr. Palmer, as over $13,000,000.^6 

During the summer of 1839 a plausible plan was hit 

^3 Western Sun. .January 28 and April 1. 1843. A letter from Dr. 
Coe. in IndionapoUs Journal. .January 28, 1842. I^etters from foreijiTt 
creditors in the Indianapolis Sentinel. .Tune 17, 1842. 

•^4 Western Sun. November 23, 1 830. 

^^ Indiannpolis Journal. Deeemher 11, 1839. 

^^Documentary Journal. 1830. pt. T, Nos. 1 and 8. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 375 

upon by the Whigs for relieving the State/''^ This consisted 
in having the national government assume the State debts, 
at least to the extent of the sales of land made in the State. 
This plan was proposed in Congress and supported by Sen- 
ator 0. H. Smith, but it was killed by an adverse report of 
Felix Grundy/''^ The same plan was advocated by Gover- 
nor Bigger in his inaugural address in 1840, in which he 
still clung to the hope that the State might, some way, com- 
plete its system. 

The legislative session of 1840-'41 was spent consid- 
ering plans of classification. From the outset there had 
been a strong party insisting on building one line at a 
time. Necessity had now brought the majority to that 
opinion. The majority of the people were still in hopes 
that the State could finish the works; and in this faith 
the classification bill of February 12, 1841, was framed. 
It divided all the lines into two classes, of which the White- 
water Canal and the Madison and Indianapolis railroad 
formed the first, and were to be completed at once. Noth- 
ing was done under this act, and a year later, the State, in 
a long, disjointed act of its legislature, finally brought to 
an end this nightmare of State canals.^^ The act pro- 
vided a superintendent for each line, who might make a 
contract, if possible, with private companies to complete 
the work. To any such company, the Governor, Treasurer, 
and Auditor of State, were empowered to transfer the 
property of the State. 

The Whitewater Canal was turned over in 1842 to a 
company organized to complete it.^^ It was finished to 
Brookville in 1843, to Connersville in 1845, and to Cam- 
bridge City in 1846. The valley was too steep, and it was 
found impossible to hold the canal. A flood in 1847 did 
$100,000 damage, and the repairs for a single flood in the 

5T Indianapolis Journal, August 11, 1840. 

58 gee speech of Grundy, Congressional Glohc, 1839-40, Appendix, 
223 and 110. 

59 Laics of Indiana, 1841, ch. 1. 

60 History of Dearl)orn and Ohio Counties. 



376 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

next year cost $80,000. The Whitewater Valley railroad 
paralleled it in 1865 and forever put it out of business. 

The Madison railroad was leased in 1840 to Branham 
& Company for one year, the State to get sixty per cent of 
the gross earnings."^ An independent company took con- 
trol in 1843. There followed an era of great prosperity 
for it. Its total receipts in 1850 were $687,619, but poor 
management and manipulation for control, together with 
the construction of the Indianapolis and Jeffersonville 
Railroad, ruined it.''- Although the State had expended 
near $2,000,000, it agreed to accept $200,000, to be paid 
in four years. As no part of this had been paid in 1855, 
a committee of the General Assembly was appointed to in- 
vestigate. It reported in favor of compromising for not 
less than $75,000, to be paid in State five per cent stocks, 
then worth about thirty cents on the dollar. 

The State sold the Central Canal in 1859 to Shoup, 
Raridan & Newman for $2,425."-' This company claimed 
valuable lands lying near the canal in Indianapolis, and 
there followed long and expensive litigation."'^ The com- 
pany later sold out to the Indianapolis Water Company. 

In addition to this the act of 1841 provided for a State 
agent to take charge of the State property in litigation in 
the East. The first of these agents was Michael G. Bright, 
of Madison. The claims due the State on "hypothecated'' 
bonds (sold on credit or given as security) aggregated 
$3,000,000.«'^ Although the State agent worked on these 
claims many years he realized little more than enough to 
pay his expenses. His report shows that bonds had been 
issued to the amount of $15,000,000.*^" From these the 
State had realized $8,593,000 in cash, while $4,000,000 
was represented by worthless securities. There remained a 

61 Ohio Falls Cities, vol. II, p. 460. 

6- Documentary Journah 185G, pt. I, No. 5. 1S53 

63 Lmcs of Indiana, 1859, ch. 110. 

64 Fifty-third Indiana Reports, p. 575. 

65 Governor's Message. Documentary JournnJ. 1841. No. 7. 
^^ Docinncntdnj Jovrmtl. 1S42. pt. I, No. 2. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 377 

balance of over $2,000,000 embezzled by various state offi- 
cers and agents/'^ 

6T Committee report by J. C. Egj;;leston, Senate Journal, 1841, 29, or 
Documentanj JournaJ, 1841, pt. I, No. 6. See also Home Journal, 1841, 
33. and Doeninentari/ Journal, 1841. 15, for report of House Committee, 
composed of Edward A. Hannei:;an, John D. Defrees. William J. Brown, 
Joseph Ritchey. John S. Davis. Ethan A. Brown. Joseph G. Marshall, 
and John S. Simonson. They recommended that suit be filed against 
Stapp and Coe at once for malversation. 

See also Docuinentari/ Journal, 1842, 1; Stapp's Report, Docutneiitanj 
Journal, 1841; Noble's Report in the same; also Report of Internal Im- 
provement Board. Dovunientanj Journal, 1837, No. 12, for an instance 
of the board's method of doing business. The State Agent's first re- 
port to the (Governor, December. 1842, is siifticient commentaiy on the 
dealings of the fund commissioners: The Cohen Brothers failing, owed 
the State $312.()(J0. In payment of this, they gave the l''und Comniis- 
si<mers their personal notes for .$(>5,0tK); cash, $14,715; bonds for Win- 
chester and Pontiac Railroad for $46,644; 751 shares of stoclt in the 
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad for $26,00<); 1,0(M) shares in American 
IJfe and Trust Company; .")»ut shares in tbe (leneral Insurance Com- 
pany, and 230 shares in the Canton Company, all for $50,000; a sec- 
ond mortgage on 52 lots in the city of Brooklyn, with a sperm and 
caudle factory, at $65,000; second mortgage on 565 lots in the second 
ward of New York City and 14 acres of laud in I'oughkeepsie for $60,- 
000; an interest in some mining stock for $1,000. It is unnecessary 
to s.iy this was all worthless ])roperty. 

Indiana's Bonded Debt in 1841 

Date of Inter- Sale Still 

Loan. Amount. To Whom Sold. est. Price. Cash. Due. 

1832 $10(».000 J. D. Beers Company .06 113 $113,260 

1834 500.000 Prime, Ward & King___ .05 101 505.250 

1835 300,000 Prime. Ward & King .05 102 :!06.150 

1835 65.257 Secretary of War .05 107 69,825 

1835 200.(K)0 J. J. Cohen & Bi-o .05 105 210,000 

1835 400.0<M) J. J. Cohen & Bro .05 104 418,000 

1835 90.000 Prime. AVard & King .05 104 94.250 

1836 100.000 J. J. Cohen & Bro .05 100 100,000 

1836 2,742 Secret.u-y of War .05 101 2.934 

1836 44O.000 Biddle and Morris C. Co. .05 lol 444.400 

1836 400,000 J. J. Cohen & Bro .05 100 400.000 

1836 589.0(10 Biddle and Morris Can._ .05 101 594.890 

1836 100,000 Law. & Indpls. R. R. Co. .05 100 100,000 

1837 30,0(X) Christmas, Livingstone.- .05 100 30,000 

1837 2.000,000 Morris Canal & Bnk. Co. .05 102 2,034,000 
■1837 121,000 Law. & Indpls. It. R. Co. .05 100 121,000 

1838 40,000 Staten Isl. Whaling Co._ .05 100 40,000 

1838 300,0<X) Western Bank of N. Y._ .05 100 60.000 240,000 

1838 100,000 Erie County Bank .05 100 100,000 

1838 100.000 Detroit & Pontiac R. R._ .05 100 10,000 90,000 



378 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

§ 70 The Settlement with the Creditors 

The Wabash and Erie Canal was a more difficult prob- 
lem to dispose of than any of the other works of the State. 
In the first place, the State had accepted a large donation 
of land from the United States on condition that it build a 
canal uniting at navigable points the waters of the Wabash 
and Lake Erie. Although the State did not fear any puni- 
tive measures on the part of the federal government, still 
the violation of the obligation would remain a disgrace to 
the State. In the second place, the State had covenanted 
with Ohio to complete a part thereof as a joint undertaking. 
Ohio had completed her part of the canal, carrying it to 
Maumee Bay, Lake Erie, in 1843. At the instance and in- 
sistence of Indiana, Ohio had built seventy-one miles of 
canal whose value depended very largely on Indiana's ful- 
filling her obligations. 

The Wabash and Erie was opened, as stated above, from 

Date of Inter- Sale Still 

Loan. Amount. To Whom Sold. est Price. Cash. Due. 

1838 60,000 Staten Island Whaliug__ .05 100 60,000 
1838-9 4,702,000 Morris Canal Co .05 90 2,136,376 2,385,383 

1839 20,000 Binghampton Bank .05 88 17,600 

1839 294.000 Indiana State Bank .06 100 294,000 

1839 200,000 Merchants Exch. Bauk__ .05 96 192.000 

1839 35,000 Bank of Commerce .05 96 33,600 

1839 47,000 Bank of North America- .05 88 1.360 40.000 

1839 221,(K)0 Madison Company .05 88 194,480 

1839 95.(X)0 Madison Company .05 88 83.600 

1841 30,000 Various persons .07 100 30.000 

1841 404,000 Various persons .05 100 131.175 * 

1841 665,000 Various persons 144.697 * 



$12,751,000 $8,732,205 $3,040,972 

There was nearly $2,000,000 in bonds out and unaccounted for. The 

fund commissioners had taken collateral securities for money still due 

on bonds "hyi>othecated." This list of the State's property furnishetl 

much amusement for facetious members. It included among others: 

Winchester & Potomac railroad bonds for $44,000; Baltimore & Ohio, 
and Baltimore & Susquehanna railroad bonds for $78,880; second mort- 
gage on 184 New York City lots, $25,000; second mortgage on forty- 
eight Brooklyn lots. $150,000; second mortgage on land in Poughkeepsie, 
$30,000; debts on wildcat banks of western New York. $240,000; Detroit 
& Potomac railroad bonds. $90,000; Erie Company Bank, $587,000; Bing- 
hampton Bank. .$.58,200; Hiram Pr.-itt. $35,600. 

(See table opp. p. 75. Doc.umeni(inj Journal, lS41-'02. ) 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 379 

Lafayette to Lake Erie, in 1843, and everything indicated 
that it would be a useful and money-making property. The 
people, as well as their creditors, had looked forward hope- 
fully to the opening of the canal to the lake. They ex- 
pected an income from it that would go far toward reliev- 
ing the State of its financial troubles. The bondholders, 
who had received no interest on their bonds for three years, 
expected to receive their interest again regularly. Both 
parties were disappointed. Although the tolls did increase 
five hundred per cent, they still fell short of paying the 
running expenses of the canal. The year 1844 brought 
no brighter prospects. A flood closed the canal for two 
months. The receipts for the year fell far short of repair 
expenditures, and the bondholders saw this hope depart, 
as all others, without bringing any money. 

The General Assembly of Indiana and many of the 
citizens were loud in their protestations of honesty, and 
there is no doubt public sentiment favored the ultimate 
payment of every dollar of the State debt. Governor Whit- 
comb said in his messages of 1844 and 1845, that the great 
mass of our fellow citizens were willing and anxious to 
meet all their just obligations. That with them it was not 
a matter of inclination, but one of ability.*^* That some 
arrangement would be made with their creditors and the 
tarnished reputation of their State restored, he would not 
permit himself to doubt. 

By a joint resolution January 13, 1845, the General 
Assembly solemnly expressed its opinion on repudiation: 
"We regard the slightest breach of plighted faith, public 
or private, as an evidence of a want of that moral principle 
upon which all obligations depend: that when any State 
in this Union shall refuse to recognize her great seal as the 
sufficient evidence of her obligation she will have for- 
feited her station in the sisterhood of States and will no 
longer be worthy of their respect and confidence." The 
governor was directed to transmit copies of this resolu- 
tion to all the States.*''^ 

^s House Journal, 1845, 19. 

^^ Laws of Indiana, 1844, 92. On the other hand, in this same lues- 



380 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

In speaking of all these fulsome protestations, State 
Auditor Horatio J. Harris said : "It would be fortunate 
for the reputation of the State as well as gratifying to her 
creditors should this evidence consist hereafter of some 
definite action, rather than general expressions of legis- 
lative opinions," Not one of these demagogues who ha- 
rangued about State honor ever showed enough courage to 
vote a measure to retrieve the State's honor. They feared 
the sullen resentment of the outraged citizen voters who 
felt that somehow the State had been swindled and that 
it did not justly owe the debt. 

Relying on this sentiment, widely and loudly expressed, 
and still hopeful of getting their money, the bondholders 
banded together and hired Charles Butler, an attorney of 
New York, to look after their claims. After visiting Michi- 
gan on a like mission, he reached Indiana in the summer 
of 1845.'" His plan was to rally the anti-repudiation 
sentiment by means of a series of public addresses. He 
recognized it as useless to demand an immediate and un- 
conditional payment of the bonds. The resources of the 
State and the condition of the currency, demoralized by 
floods of treasury notes, bank scrip, "white dog," "blue 
dog," and "blue pup," all depreciated from forty to sixty 
per cent, vv^ere such that it is doubtful if this could have 
been done. He began then by flattering the people on the 
Wabash with the hopes of finishing that canal to the Ohio 
river. Whether he believed the canal, so improved, would 
be a paying property, or whether he wished merely to re- 
vive the courage of the people, is not known. In the face 
of the facts as he knew them, the latter seems to have 
been his intention, hoping in the future to get the State 

snge, pjige IS, the (Tovernor s;iys: "The opinion has hitherto been near- 
ly, if not quite, universally held anion.i;' our citizens, as well as others 
acquainted with our cojiditions and resources, that it is beyond the power 
of our State, at present, to fully meet our obli.srations. Even the plan 
submitted at our last session of the Senate, virtually made that con- 
cession b.v proposing to convert our bonds, bearing tive per cent, interest, 
into a stock bearing only tliree. No ]ilan that has been mooted for a 
resumption of payment, even the most stringent, has contemplated a full 
and immediate payment." 

'i'o Indiana Dcniocrat, Dec, 1845. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 381 

to pay the bonds in full and take charge of the finished 
canal. 

He began his campaign at Terre Haute, where in an 
address in May, 1845, he proposed to divide the interest on 
the State debt into two parts, one of which should be paid 
by the State, the other from the revenues of the canal. 
These views were transmitted to the General Assembly in 
a memorial. The question of the settlement of the debt 
had some influence on the fall elections, but not so much 
as was hoped. There was a general restlessness among 
the people, under the charges of repudiation then being 
made against the State, but no sweeping sentiment for full 
payment could be aroused. 

It was arranged to have Mr. Butler meet a joint com- 
mittee of the General Assembly, as it was understood he 
had a specific proposition to make. On December 19, Mr. 
Butler met the committee and he submitted his plan as 
follows : 

1. For arrears of interest, the State should give certifi- 
cates payable by 1851 ; or if not paid then, to be funded 
into five per cent stocks. 

2. The State should pay, by taxation, three per cent 
interest on the debt up to 1851. 

3. All arrears of interest up to 1851 to be funded at 
five per cent. After 1851, three per cent interest to be paid 
promptly by tax and two per cent from tolls of the canal. 
It w^as understood that the State was to finish the canal to 
the Ohio river.^^ 

In a message, December 27, 1845, the governor urged 
the General Assembly to accept Butler's proposition. It 
would place the credit of the State on a certain basis ; it 
would aid returning prosperity; it would turn the tide of 
settlement to our State again, thought the governor. ''■- 

It did not take the joint committee long to come to an 
agreement. On Christmas day it notified Mr. Butler that it 
could not accede to his demands and inquired if he had 

71 Iiidiana Dciiiocrat, Dec. 23, 1845. Also Dcctiineiitiinj Journal, 1845, 
pt. IT, No. 21. 

Ti Documentary Journal, 1845, No. 8, 18. 



382 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

anything better to propose. The attitude of the committee 
was not at all creditable. They seemed to be negotiating 
for a bargain with their own creditors rather than trying 
to uphold the honor of the State. 

The next day Mr. Butler was again before the com- 
mittee and made what is known as his second proposition. 
It differed very little from the first. Elaborate tables were 
submitted showing how the State could meet all its obliga- 
tions. One could not fail to agree with Butler, that the 
State was able to meet all its obligations honorably, except 
for two reasons. These were, first, the demoralized con- 
dition of the currency, and second, the leadership of a 
clique of oily politicians. Neither of these reasons is credit- 
able to the State. A State levy of 70 cents would have 
paid principal and interest. Ohio was meeting her debt 
in that way. Indiana would have done no less had her 
General Assembly risen to the occasion. 

A bill was finally drawn along the lines of Butlers 
propositions and introduced in the Senate by Joseph 
Lane'" — the same man who had declared he would cut 
cordwood to pay his part of the debt. The measure en- 
grossed the attention of the Assembly completely. The 
House was Democratic, the Senate Whig. There was little 
straightforward policy manifested in either branch. Both 
parties finally agreed to postpone action on the bill till 
after the party conventions on January 9. Even after both 
parties in convention had endorsed the Butler bill, the 
Democrats in caucus decided to refer the whole matter to 
the people in the August elections. The governor and 
leaders of the party succeeded in breaking the Democratic 
caucus. January 19, 1846, Governor James Whitcomb at- 
tached his signature to the bill. 

General satisfaction was felt no doubt, throughout the 
State at what was felt to be a final adjustment of the State 
debt. Butler left for New York, February 20, and the New 
York papers generally expressed approval of the settle- 
ment."^ The long law of thirty-five sections was very care- 
ts jntZiana Democrat, .Ian. 6. 1846. 
"-• Indiana Dcmocnit. April 14. 1846. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 383 

lessly drawn, and was soon found to be impossible of 
execution.'^ ^'' The bondholders had lost enough money with- 
out investing the $2,225,000 called for under the law. No 
bonds were surrendered under it. 

When the General Assembly convened again in Decem- 
ber, 1846, Mr. Butler was on the ground demanding some 
amendments. A bill purporting to be an amendment was 
drawn, and after a long struggle received the governor's 
approval January 27, 1847."^ The new bill was founded on 
the option contained in the thirty-second section of the 
previous law. Its general effect was to divide the outstand- 
ing bonds of the State, except those known as the Bank 
bonds, into two equal parts. One of these parts, with its 
accumulated interest, was assumed by the State, and the 
other was made a debt on the canal for which the State 
assumed no further responsibility. The canal was deeded 
to the bondholders and they were forced to accept the 
compromise.'^" 

"i^ It provided that the bonded debt should be refunded entirely. The 
old five per cent bonds were to be surrendered and in their stead new 
State registered stocks created. First, there should be issued State 
two and one-half per cent twenty-year registered bonds equal in amount 
to the face of the old bonds. Second, the arrears of interest should be 
funded, at the rate of two and one-half per cent from 1S41 to 1S47. in- 
clusive, in like bonds as the principal. The State agreed to pay interest 
on the above bonds at the rate of two per cent if a State tax levy of 
25 cents on the $100 and a poll tax of 75 cents should furnish sufficient 
funds after the ordinary State exi)enses were paid. The remaining one- 
half per cent and any arrears by reason of the failure of the above tax 
levy to bring in suflBcient revenue were to be funded or paid as the State 
should choose January 1. 1S53. P'or the payment of the remaining two 
and one-half per cent of annual interest the bondholders were to look 
entirely to the Wabash and Erie canal. In order that the canal might 
be more productive, the bondholders were given permission to raise a 
sum of not less than $2,225,000 to complete the canal to the Ohio river. 
The canal was to be placed in trust by the State, and its earnings and 
land grants set aside and pledged to the payment of the bondholders. 
These last loans were not to become a debt chargeable against the State, 
though in this law the State remained pledged to pay the principal of the 
entire State debt. 

"t^ Laics of Indiana, 1S46. eh. 1. Benton (WahasJi Trade Route. 73) 
calls this bill a "few minor modifications." and leaves the impression that 
there was no opposition worth considering. In fact, the fight on this 
was longer and more acrid than on the other. 

77 The conditions of the compromise close with the following notice 



384 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The outstanding bonded debt of the State July 1, 1847, 
was $11,048,000.''' These bonds were held in New York and 
London and the debt was always referred to as the foreign 
debt, in distinction from the State scrip and treasury notes, 
which were called the domestic or floating debt. The inter- 
est on the bonds had not been paid for six years, and the 
arrears added to the principal brought the total foreign 
debt up to $13,120,692. 

If Indiana can be charged with repudiation, it must be 
done on account of this law of 1847. No one will for a 
moment contend that the bondholders would have pre- 
ferred the arrangement of 1847 to the payment of the 
bonds according to their tenor. The bonds at this time 
were never quoted higher than thirty cents on the dollar. 
Yet they were not depreciated more than the debt which 
the United States paid in 1789. Even at thirty cents, men 
like John Jacob Astor and the elder Belmont bought In- 
diana bonds and exchanged them for the new five per cent 
stocks, and made a good profit. Two facts stand out promi- 
nently. The State made a bargain with its creditors, and 
its creditors lost half their invested money. Two parties 
were deeply wronged : the persons who had invested their 
earnings in State bonds expecting to enjoy in their old 
age the comforts of a certain income;''' and the citizens of 
Indiana who had entrusted their credit and honor to their 
government, and had been robbed of both. For it cannot 

to the bondbolders : "Tbe St.-ite will iii.ikc no ]irovision bereifter to priy 
eitber priiicii);il or interest on any internal ini])roveuient bonds luitil 
tbe bolder shall tirst have surrenderefl such bonds to the agent of the 
State and shall have received in lieu thereof certificates of stock as pro- 
vided in tbe fii'st section of this act. Anythinsr in this act to the con- 
trary notwithstanding." This proviso makes the law of 1847 very dif- 
ferent from tbe harmless one of 184(5. It must also be kept in mind that 
the provisions of this law are not the same as those laid down in Butler's 
first or second proposals. 

T^ Docunioiinry Journal. 1847. 102. Reiiort of Agent of State. 

T^ Documentarj/ Jounuil, 184.5, pt. 11, 27.S. A memorial from the 
New York Savings Bank. This pictures some of the suffering caused 
b.v tbe State's failure to pay its interest promptly. See also letters from 
foreign cieditors to Governor AVhitcomb, Indiaiuvpolis ffcntinch June 17, 
1842. See also Documentary Journal, 1844, pt. I, No. 5, IndianO/polis 
Sentinel, June 17, 1842. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 385 

be denied that the reputation of Indiana suffered greatly 
in this transaction. Nearly all the Indiana bonds then out- 
standing had been taken out of the State's hands wrong- 
fully by being sold on credit in the face of a law to the 
contrary. More than one-third of the bonds had been se- 
cured from the State in the first instance by criminal col- 
lusion, the agent of the State being at the same time a 
member of the firm of brokers who took the bonds, sold 
them, and failed to pay the State the proceeds. The State 
of Michigan was similarly swindled, and promptly repudi- 
ated the bonds so obtained. This step was seriously con- 
sidered in the Indiana legislature during the session of 
1845-'46, and might have been done but for the opinion of 
the State agent, Michael G. Bright, who advised the Gen- 
eral Assembly against it. The correspondence of the gov- 
ernor for years afterward contains evidences of the bit- 
terness of the bondholders on this subject. 

§ 71 Finishing the Wabash and Erie Canal 

The act of January 28, 1842, as indicated above, left the 
Wabash and Erie east of Lafayette in the hands of a com- 
missioner selected by the General Assembly. An act of 
January 1, 1842, had already provided for building the 
canal on down to Terre Haute. The commissioner was di- 
rected to let contracts for as much of it every session as 
could be paid for with available funds. To expedite mat- 
ters as much as possible, canal scrip was to be issued. This 
scrip was made receivable at the canal land offices in pay- 
ment for the lands donated under act of Congress March 
2, 1827, and confirmed by act of February, 1841. By a 
later act this scrip was made receivable for all tolls, water 
rents, and other dues to the canal. As the canal crept 
slowly southward more lands were made available, under 
the grant of 1827. Work proceeded slowly. Tolls failed 
to do more than pay for repairs.'"^ Superintendent E. F. 
Lucas reported receipts for land during the year 1844, as 
$85,855; tolls and rents, $58,212; expenses, $94,466. It 

»•' Coiuuiissioner's Iteport. Ducumcntary Journal, 1843. 



386 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

is reported that a single flood caused most of this extra- 
ordinary expense. In spite of all obstacles the canal was 
pushed steadily downward to Terre Haute. For 1845, the 
tolls were $95,473 ; income from land sales, $108,943 ; while 
the expense for repairs was $106,344.'^^ During this 
season the canal was short of water a great part of the 
time. This was to be supplied partly by the feeder at 
Northport.s- Business was reviving rapidly and there 
was every indication of prosperity in the transportation 
business. But the rotten condition of the wooden aque- 
ducts and inadequate supply of water from the feeders did 
not promise so well for the canal. In 1844, the canal had 
been placed under a single superintendent for its whole 
length. 

A considerable export trade was growing up. Docks, 
warehouses, and elevators were springing up over night 
at Logansport, Attica, Peru, Lafayette, Huntington, Lagro, 
Pittsburg, Lockport, Wabash, Fort Wayne, and Montezuma, 
not to mention a score of lesser towns long since disap- 
peared and forgotten. All kinds of craft swarmed on 
the canal. 

July 2, 1845, the surveyor, R. H. Fontleroy, was ordered 
by Governor Whitcomb to finish surveying the canal down 
to Evansville. He accordingly began the survey at the 
summit of the Eel River canal. To get water at this place 
was the most troublesome problem on the whole line from 
Lake Erie to the Ohio. A feeder was planned at Rawley's 
Mill. Next, it was decided to dam Splunge creek. This 
would require an embankment one mile long and fifteen 
feet high. This dam was made twenty feet wide on top so 
that it could be used as a wagon road. The reservoir thus 
formed would cover 3,900 acres and hold one billion cubic 
feet of water. A second reservoir was planned and surveyed 
high up Eel river, near Monrovia, in Morgan county. The 

81 Documenlani Journal. 1845. No. 17. 

82 An excellent description of the work at Northport was furnished 
the writer by Miss Anna Caseley, of the Kendallville High School. Her 
paper (History of Sylvan Lake and Vicinity) ought to be published. The 
Northport reservoir was at Rome City, Noble county. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 387 

Monrovia reservoir was to cover 3,500 acres. From Raw- 
ley's Mill the canal survey was continued down the bank 
of Eel river. This was the third canal site that had been 
laid down along this river. At Point Commerce it con- 
nected with the Central survey down White river.^- The 
canal crossed White river at Newberry. Skirting the east- 
ern edge of the White River Valley, it crossed Daviess 
county, touching Maysville. It crossed Driftwood on an 
aqueduct one mile from its mouth. It left White river and 
passed by way of Petersburg, Pigeon Summit and Pigeon 
creek to Evansville. 

This was the work undertaken by the bondholders under 
the Butler bill. The surveyor placed the total cost at 
$2,502,813, of which $966,544 had already been expended. 
The canal was in operation by 1847, as far down as Coal 
creek near Cayuga, thirty-six miles above Terre Haute. 
The water was insufficient below Lafayette and feeders had 
to be constructed, one at St. Mary's and another eight miles 
west of Logansport at Crooked creek. The whole canal 
from Lake Erie to the Ohio was 458 miles long. The 
board hoped to have the whole line to Evansville under 
construction by 1850.^^ During the year 1848 there v/ere 
189 miles of canal in use, extending from Coal creek to 
the Ohio State line. Ninety-six miles of construction were 
under contract. One thousand seven hundred eighty men 
were at work, scattered from Coal creek to Patoka Sum- 
mit. Three hundred and forty-two thousand dollars were 
expended for construction, and $35,000 for repairs. Tolls 
had arisen to $146,148. 

The work was not successful during 1849, although the 
board began in the spring with more than ordinary vigor. 
A flood during the winter caused $31,600 damage on the 
Eel River section. Contracts were let at Washington, 
Daviess county, June 27, 1849, for the section from New- 
berry to Maysville — twenty-three miles — for $160,000. The 
construction from Maysville to Petersburg — twenty miles — 
was placed under contract at Petersburg, November 14, 

^^Documentary Journal, 1S45, No. 17. 2. 
84 Documentary Journal, 1847, pt. II, No. 6. 



388 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

for $278,000. The canal was opened to commerce from the 
Ohio line to Lodi. But the prosperity of the early part of 
the season was not to last. Cholera broke out in several 
places along the canal, especially at Toledo and Lafayette. 
The plague affected the canal in every direction. It stopped 
the sales of land, it cut the tolls to $135,000, $11,000 
below the previous year, although a long stretch of canal 
was opened for the first time. It demoralized the con- 
struction gangs, and, finally, it killed trustee Thomas H. 
Blake at Cincinnati as he was returning from Washing- 
ton, D. C, on business for the canal.''"' 

For the season of 1850 the canal opened March 18, and 
closed December 8 — 261 days. During this time there was 
no interruption. The long delayed hopes of the promoters 
seemed at last about to be realized. Boats arrived at Lodi, 
October 25, 1849 ; they passed the Eel River division to 
Point Commerce and Washington, June 7, 1850. This lat- 
ter point is seventy-nine miles from Coal Creek, 268 miles 
from the State line, and 352 miles from Toledo. The last 
section, from Petersburg to Evansville, was placed under 
contract September 6, 1850, and was to be completed in 
1852. This year the cholera broke out among the work- 
men and killed 150 men. A panic set in and the fleeing 
workmen carried the plague all over the country. The 
tolls this year ran up to $157,158, a gain of $22,500. 

The whole canal was closed for a full month during the 
season of 1851, on account of floods. Notwithstanding this, 
the tolls increased $22,000. The work was received from 
the contractors down to the White river crossing at New- 
berry, 281 miles from the State line. One thousand two 
hundred men were at work during the season. The trus- 
tees ordered the part of the canal in Evansville to be made 
sixty feet wide in order to form a local harbor. The an- 
nual report shows $58,549 for repairs, and that $65,000 
had been expended for bridges, of which there were 150 
over the canal. ^'^ Many of these that had been built earlier 

83 Governor Wrifrht, Message of ISr^O. in House .hninml. See mIso 
Dociimentani Journal. 1849, pt. TI. No. 11. 

8^ DocKinoifdiji -Tonrnnh 1S.'>1. ])t. I, No. 7. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 389 

were rotten and many complaints on this account found 
their way into court. Seven of these suits were carried 
into the State supreme court. The canal trustees were 
slow in adjusting damages, and an act of February 13, 

1851, directed that injured parties should file their com- 
plaints with the canal board, and if no relief was secured 
in ninety days they should file suit in the circuit court.^^ 
A law similar to the one mentioned above gave authority 
to road supervisors to institute suit to compel the canal 
board to rebuild rotten bridges. ^^ The citizens of Williams- 
port tried by mandamus suit to force the board to build 
a lateral canal over to that town, and, failing in their 
suit, they dug one themselves and forcibly connected it 
with the main canal. This left the main canal almost dry 
for some time.^^ 

The water was let into the Maysville division in June, 

1852. Laden boats then made the trip all the way from 
Toledo to Maysville, 392 miles. At a meeting held in May, 
1852, it was agreed to lower all tolls and tariffs on the canal 
forty per cent. After this reduction the total receipts still 
rose to $193,400, a gain of $14,000. This was the high- 
water mark for toll on the Wabash and Erie. This is the 
more significant because it came before the whole canal 
was opened. The work was about done to Petersburg, and 
$262,281 had been expended on the Evansville division, 
showing that it, too, was well-nigh completed. There was 
transported on the canal this year 2,300,000 bushels of corn, 
1,606,000 bushels of wheat, and 88,000 barrels of salt. The 
expenses of operation this year were $67,237."'^ Deducting 
this from the gross tolls, there remains $126,163 as the net 
returns of the canal at its best. This would pay five per 
cent on two and one-half millions. While this does not 
look very favorable to us, yet in the steadily increasing 
tolls one can see some grounds for the hope that with a 

87 Laivs of Indiana, 1851. 
■ ss Laws of Indiana, 1852. 

^^Documentary JonrnaJ, 1S54. No. 21. 

^^ Docuwentanj Jovrnnl, 1852. pt. II. No. 7. 

(26) 



390 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

terminal on the Ohio river tolls would increase enough so 
that the whole canal would become dividend-paying. 

While the outlook in this direction was encouraging to 
the canal builders, the outlook in other directions was ex- 
tremely gloomy. Complaints, honest and dishonest, ending 
in lawsuits, multiplied all along the canal. Floods tied up 
navigation for days, weeks, or even months. Fleets ot 
boats were grounded for weeks at a time in shallow water, 
or by breaks in the embankments, while their cargoes of 
farm products, sometimes live animals, depreciated or be- 
came utterly worthless. At best there was traffic during 
only eight months of the year. The Evansville and Terre 
Haute railroad was already under construction, and the 
Fort Wayne and Covington (Wabash Valley), and the 
Crawfordsville and Vincennes had been organized. These, 
it will be noticed, paralleled the canal throughout its 
length.'" The tolls for 1853 dropped to $181,207, due to 
poor crops. A great deal of trouble was had with the banks 
along the deep cut south of Petersburg. A flood in White 
river destroyed all the aqueducts from Point Commerce to 
Newberry and piled the drift high against the big aque- 
duct at that place. The citizens, thinking the extreme 
high water due to the big aqueduct, indicted the trustees 
for maintaining a nuisance ; but the legislature stopped the 
prosecution.'-'- All the locks, gates, dams, towpaths, and 
bridges were reported rotten and giving away. 

The Birch Creek Reservoir was built during this year. 
It covered about six square miles, and the inhabitants of 
the district regarded it as a fruitful source of malaria. 
The General Assembly had it investigated in 1854 and it 
was reported quite healthful.-' •"• A mob of armed men black- 
ened their faces and cut the dam at midday. May 10, 1855. 
This left the whole of the Eel River section dry. The loss 
on the dam was over $10,000. Governor Wright sent the 
militia from Evansville under General Dodds and Captain 
Denby to protect the work. They found everything quiet 

'Ji Documenfanj Joiinuil, 1S52, pt. II, No. 7. 
92 Laws of Indiana, 1S53, March 4. 
^3 History of Clay County, Index. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 391 

and spent the season hunting, fishing, and playing cards 
with the settlers. The next day after the soldiers left, 
the dam was again leveled. Many men were arrested, but 
were promptly released by the local magistrates.^^ This 
trouble never was settled, and this division of the canal was 
rendered useless by the lawlessness of the people of that 
neighborhood. The reservoirs were swamps full of the 
natural growi;h of the forest, and in summer became stag- 
nant frog ponds. 

By the year 1856 it was manifest to all that the canal 
was doomed. The tolls dropped to $113,000 and expenses 
for repairs rose to $106,000. The whole section from Terre 
Haute to Evansville was rendered useless on account of 
the destruction of the Birch Creek Reservoir. Again the 
board of trustees reduced the toll rates on the canal. This 
failed to hold the trade. All the lighter articles of com- 
merce were shipped by rail.""' Fortunately for the State, 
the scrip issued to finance the canal was about all redeemed. 
Over $1,200,000 had been issued and all was now in except 
$15,000. The State was thus free of all obligations to it.»6 

The report of 1857 left no question of the future of the 
canal. The tolls were $60,000 for the whole line. There 
was no regular navigation, no through traffic, as had been 
hoped. South of Terre Haute the tolls were $8,000 and re- 
pair expenses $40,000. The repairs for the whole line 
amounted to $115,000. The St. Joseph river broke around 
the feeder dam and it required $7,500 to repair the 
breach."' A series of local floods in the Wabash Valley dur- 
ing the summer of 1858 did heavy damage. Wild Cat, Wea, 
Coal creek, Spring creek, and Otter creek overflowed and 
carried away their aqueducts. The Wabash broke over its 
banks in Terre Haute and destroyed forty-six rods of canal. 
The entire damage was $55,000. Navigation was suspended 
from June 10 to August 26. The annual expenses of the 
canal, $181,000, exceeded tolls and land sales combined by 

94 Documentary Journal, 1855, pt. II. No. 3. 
93 Documentary Journal, 18.56. pt. II, No. 6, Trustees' Report. 
96 lUd., pt. I, No. 3. State Auditor's Report. 
^'^Documentary Journal, 1857, pt. II, No. 4. 



392 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

$60,000. The stockholders ordered the trustees to close any 
part of the canal not paying expenses. The part from Terre 
Haute to Evansville was at once closed.^'^ After the canal 
board, in January, 1859, ordered all officers to quit, only a 
few local engineers, at reduced salaries, remained in ser- 
vice. In this year, a bondholder, named Johji Ferguson, 
secured an injunction from Justice McLean preventing the 
use of any money, except tolls, for making repairs. The 
canal was then divided into three sections which were let 
to persons who would keep the canal in repair for its use.^^ 
The south section from Terre Haute to Evansville was not 
kept repaired at all. The Birch Creek Reservoir was cut 
for the last time. The first breach in the long fill across 
Daviess county was left unfixed. Navigation was finally 
abandoned south of Terre Haute in 1860, although a few 
miles in Vanderburgh county remained open a year longer. 
Two men. Miller and Hedges, undertook to keep the line 
open from the Eel river dam to Terre Haute and with the 
aid of a gift of $1,000 from the city succeeded for a short 
time. The part from Terre Haute to Toledo remained 
open during the year. The Wabash railroad began a rate 
war at this time and soon attracted all trade from the 
canal. The railroad did this by a free use of rebates. By 
1870 little more than a succession of stagnant pools marked 
the site of the former canal. A law of February 14, 1873, 
permitted the county commissioners to keep local sections 
of the canal in repair, but only a few temporary repairs 
were made. The trustees formally surrendered their trust 
in 1874. They had paid $436,545 for repairs and had re- 
ceived $274,019 in tolls.i<>*> 

A decree was obtained in 1874 under which the canal 
was sold February 12, 1876. There was realized from this 
sale $96,260. All told, the bondholders received about forty 
per cent of the $800,000 which they had advanced for the 
completion of the canal. 

The bondholders were not entirely silenced by the joint 

98 Documentary Journal, 1858, pt. 1. No. 3. 
^^Documentary Journal, 18T}9. pt. I. No. 8. 
100 Twenty-eighth Aunual Report, 1874, Docum,entnry Joi(rn<il. No. 14. 



SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 393 

resolution of the General Assembly of 1857. Fearing that 
a future General Assembly might be induced to pay the 
debt, or some part of it, the General Assembly of 1871 
submitted a constitutional amendment to the voters provid- 
ing that "No law or resolution shall ever be passed by the 
General Assembly of the State of Indiana that shall recog- 
nize any liability of this State to pay or redeem any cer- 
tificate of stock issued in pursuance" of the settlement of 
1847. This was agreed to by the next General Assembly 
and submitted to the voters. ^"^ By proclamation of the 
governor this was voted on on February 18, 1873. The 
voters took little interest in the election. Indianapolis cast 
2,679 votes for and 14 against the amendment. Evans- 
ville's vote favored it by 1,365 to 12; Terre Haute, 1,502 
for, and 1,520 against; Fort Wayne 950 for, 12 against. 
The amendment was carried and the question settled. Thus 
closed the story of the old Wabash and Erie. The State 
and bondholders had expended all told, $8,259,244. They 
had received from land and tolls, $5,477,238. A magnifi- 
cent land grant by the federal government had been 
squandered. The total amount of land donated was 1,457,- 
366 acres, or 2,277 sections ; an area equal to the five largest 
counties or the ten smallest.^ °- This was twice as much 
as the whole donation for the common schools.^^^ 

101 Laws of Indiana, 1873, 83. 

102 Donaldson, Public Domain, 755. 

103 American Almanac, 1857, 323. gives a brief summary of State 
and canal debts. 



CHAPTER XVII 
the second state bank of indiana, 1834-1857 

§ 72 Chartering the Bank, 1834 

The second period in Indiana banking begins with the 
charter of a new State Bank in 1834.i The agitation for a 
State bank began as soon as the election of 1832 settled the 
fate of the Second Bank of the United States. The State 
Bank of 1834 was the heir in Indiana of this United States 
Bank whose charter expired in 1836. It was favored and 
upheld by the Clay party in the State. Why the voters of 
the State always supported Jackson, and at the same time 
favored the United States Bank, a high tariff, and internal 
improvements is one of the unexplained facts of Indiana 
politics of this period. A State bank was not, however, 
an issue in the State election of 1832. After it was ascer- 
tained that Clay was defeated and that the Second Bank 
of the United States would not be rechartered, speculation 
began as to what would take its place. 

Soon after the October election in 1832, a movement 
was started to reorganize the old Farmers and Mechanics* 
Bank of Madison, Indiana. This bank had always borne 
a good reputation, and the character of its officers assured 
it a good standing among business men.- John Sering 
was a member of its board of directors and J. F. D. Lanier 
was its cashier. A new set of banknote plates was struck. 

1 Dewey (State Banking Before the Civil War, 43). says this was an 
extension of tlie earlier charter. This is an error. The charter of the 
earlier bank was annulled in 1S22 by the Knox county, Indiana, circuit 
court. The first State bank is treated in chapter X, above. 

2 These were Victor King. i)resideut : John Vawter. John Sering, John 
Woodburn, and Milton Stapp. directors; J. F. D. Lanier, cashier. Dem- 
ocrat, Oct. 13, 1832. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 395 

and every arrangement made to take the tide of oppor- 
tunity at its flood. There was in Indiana no branch of 
the Second Bank of the United States; nevertheless its 
currency and power reached and controlled the State 
through the branches at Cincinnati and Louisville. 

Early in the session of 1832, a bill for a State bank 
charter was introduced in the Indiana General Assembly. 
The report on this bill by the senate committee, of which 
John Ewing-^ was chairman, is the best exposition of the 
various views of the legislature on the subject of banking. 
In this report, which was dated January 1, 1833, Mr. 
Ewing suggested five plans by which a circulating medium 
for Indiana might be secured : 

1. The General Assembly might memorialize the Con- 
gress of the United States to recharter a national bank. 

2. Congress might be induced to issue a national cur- 
rency and apportion it among the States according to 
population. 

3. The General Assembly might issue a State cur- 
rency predicated upon the proceeds of canals, school lands, 
the Michigan Road, and salt springs, and managed by a 
board of commissioners. 

4. The General Assembly might order an issue of 
treasury notes bearing five per cent interest. 

5. The General Assembly might organize a partnership 
bank — State and people. 

The First State Bank of Indiana had almost destroyed 
credit, endangered the validity of contracts, and so lessened 
the confidence of man in man that ordinary business was 
seriously deranged. Moreover, it had injured the credit 
of the State, and had given to its citizens a weakened repu- 
tation for financial integrity. Mr. Ewing thought it the 
duty of the State to guard against the repetition of such 
a calamity, and oppose every possible bar to such an issue 
of "Owl Creek" currency. Finally, he said, the committee 

3 John Ewing was bora in Ireland: came to Vineennes and engaged 
in mercantile pursuits; represented his county in the House in 1819 
and in the Senate from 1825 to 1835. and from 1842 to 1844. He also 
served in the twenty-third and twenty-fifth Congresses. 



396 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

believed a national paper currency preferable to any State 
emissions. A national bank was thought better than a 
State bank on account of its wider power, its national 
affiliation, and its greater uniformity.^ 

In general, the members of the committee agreed with 
Mr. Ewing. They favored a national bank with State 
branches. State controlled; and recommended that Indiana 
organize a branch, and by issuing State five per cent bonds 
buy $800,000 of this national currency. Out of the divi- 
dends, they estimated, the five per cent on the loan could 
be paid, and the surplus would go far toward the establish- 
ment of free primary schools throughout the State. 

At the same time there was a bill before the Senate 
to charter a co-partnership bank with nine branches.'' 
If any branch failed to pay six per cent it was to be closed. 
The State was to take one-half of the stock, which was to 
be non-taxable, and the charter was to run twenty-seven 
years. Another bill for chartering State banks had been 
introduced and passed in the House. There were at this 
time three bank bills before the General Assembly. The 
Committee Bill was not discussed. 

There was a long, earnest, and sometimes angry dis- 
cussion of these measures. Some members favored a free 
banking law; others favored none at all, believing nothing 
but "hard money" should circulate. A large majority, 
however, favored a State bank but could not agree on a 
charter. A motion to postpone action till the following 
session prevailed in the Senate by a vote of 14 to 13. The 
Jackson men, seemingly, were as much dejected by the de- 
feat as the Clay men.« 

4 This report is given in tlie IndUuut Jminial. .Jan. 2. 1S33. The In- 
diana Journal was pnblishetl at Inclian:ii>oli!i. aurl was the organ of the 
Whigs. 

5 Indiana Journal, Jan. 5, 183.3. 

6 The three bills are worthy of attention as a reflection of the jiopular 
views on banking. The Committee Bill provided for the Bank of the 
State of Indiana, to be located at Indianapolis, with power vested in 
the first directors to establish five branches in whatever counties they 
thought best. The $1,600,000 capital was to be divided into shares of 
.$50 each, and one-half was to be furnished by the State, the other half 
by individuals. Seven directors for the yiarent bank were to be elected 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 397 

The general necessity of a bank was conceded. There 
was some objection to enacting a State monopoly, and the 
experience with the old Vincennes Bank made men hesi- 
tate to charter another State bank. But on the whole 
the people were strongly in favor of a State bank and 
were deeply disappointed at the failure of the Senate to 
enact a charter. 

The bank question contested with that of internal im- 
provements for the chief place in the campaign of 1833."^ 
The General Assembly that met in December, 1833, lost lit- 
tle time in getting together on a bank charter.*^ A bill 
was before the House for discussion on the 6th of Jan- 
uary. It passed the House by a majority of 48 to 23 ; and 
the Senate by 18 to 11. 

The provisions of this charter show that it was care- 
fully drawn.'' It has no trace of any interests contrary 
to the public welfare. The State was divided into ten 
districts as nearly equal as possible and the directors were 
to establish a branch in each district. The directors were 
given power to locate an eleventh and twelfth branch as 

;muii;illy by the General Assembly, who were to choose six directors for 
each branch. The iudividual stockholders were to elect six directors 
for the parent bank and seven each for the branches. Non-residents 
were not to vote in stockholders' meetinjjs. P^ach director must own at 
least ten shares, and no one could sit as director in two branches. The 
stock was non-taxable; six per cent was made the legal rate of interest; 
the charter was to run twenty-seven years, and the State auditor and 
treasurer were to visit and inspect both bank and branches. 

The House Bill resembled the senate bill very much. The capital 
stock was the same, and the location and number of branches were to 
be the same; unpaid stock, however, was to be secured by a mortgage, 
and stock could not be given as security on a loan. Each branch was 
a separate corporation; specie payment was necessary, but the branches 
were not mutually resi^onsible. No municipal corporation could borrow 
over $5,000 and no State, or county, officer could be a director in the 
bank. The profits were to go to education. As passed by the House, 
this bill provided for thirteen directors, five chosen by the General 
Assembly, and eight by the stockholders; and the luinimum capital for 
each branch was to be $50,000, instead of $80,000. The Farrington 
or Senate Bill is printed in the Indiana Journal, Feb. 16, 1838; the 
House Bill in the issue of Feb. 2.3 ; and the Bwing or Committee Bill 
in the issue of March 9. 

"* Indiana Journal, May 4, 1833. 

8 Indiana Journal, Jan. 1, 1834. 

s Laws of Indiana, 18.34. ch. vii. 



398 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

soon as the commercial situation seemed to demand it. 
The head office was to be at Indianapolis, but there was 
no parent bank. The branches were on an equality, and 
the Indianapolis branch was not to enjoy any prestige 
nor exert any undue influence over the other branches. 
This charter forbade the bank's dealing at all in real estate. 
The provision worked to the advantage of the bank, for the 
people had more faith in a bank that did not deal in real 
estate. It was to be a strictly specie-paying institution, 
and if at any time it refused to redeem its notes in specie 
it was to forfeit its charter, a provision which was later 
disregarded in a critical period of its life. This provision 
in its charter put it in a class with the best banks in our 
history, and clearly set it off from the "wildcat" brood 
then springing up in all the surrounding States. 

The rate of discount was fixed at six per cent, and it 
was to issue no notes under five dollars; but this limita- 
tion was removed in 1841, after which the bank was al- 
lowed to issue notes as low as one dollar. The president 
was elected by the General Assembly for a term of five 
years at a salary of from $1,000 to $1,500. For the State 
Bank the General Assembly chose four directors, and each 
branch one. These constituted what was known as the 
bank board. This board had full power over the branches, 
and could make examination, personally, or require a re- 
port of any branch without a day's notice. The bank 
board in its turn made an annual report to the General 
Assembly, It appointed three directors yearly for each 
branch, and the stockholders chose from seven to ten 
more. The branch boards elected presidents and cashiers 
for the branches. None of the officers could hold State 
offices while on the bank boards; nor could any stock- 
holder give his stock as security for a loan; nor could a 
president, cashier, or director, endorse for anyone or for 
each other. 

The capital of the bank was placed at $1,600,000, later 
raised to $2,500,000 by an amendment adopted March 1, 
1836, One-half of the entire capital stock was subscribed 
by the State. Each branch was to have an equal part of 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 399 

the capital, i. e., $160,000, at first, and after the amend- 
ment of 1836, $250,000. The policy in organizing was to 
distribute the stock as widely as possible, and for this 
purpose the State arranged to lend money on real estate 
mortgages to subscribers of bank stock. To carry out this 
provision of the charter and pay for its own subscriptions 
the State borrowed in the East $1,300,000. The charter 
was to run twenty-five years, expiring January 1, 1859. 

One cannot fail to note the great care displayed in the 
charter to make the bank safe, and its circulation sound. 
All the arts known to "swindling bankers" were guarded 
against.i" As indicated above, the notes were signed by 
the local cashier and the central president. There was 
mutual responsibility among the branches, but not a di- 
vision of profits, each branch retaining all it earned. The 
bank board might limit the loans of any branch to one 
and one-fourth times the paid in capital ; and might call 
for reports monthly or oftener, or take control, and close 
a branch permanently. It might take funds from one 
branch, when they were not being used, and transfer them 
to another in need of money. No branch might have more 
debts due it than twice its capital ; later this limit was 
raised to two and one-half times. A subscriber had to 
pay $18.75 in cash on each $50 share. The State furnished 
the balance, $31.25, and took freehold security, double the 
value of the loan. The loans to subscribers were to run 
from twenty to thirty years. All money earned by the 
State stock, above the five per cent interest on the bonds, 
was to go inta the hands of the commissioners of the 
sinking fund, by whom it was to be lent on freehold se- 
curity. 

§ 73 Organization and Policy of the Bank 

It was impossible at this time to concentrate the trade 
of Indiana in one center as was done in Ohio at Cincinnati, 
in Kentucky at Louisville, and in New York at New York 

10 The reference is to :i territorial law of 1815 in which private bank- 
ers are called "swindling bankers." 



400 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

City.i^ The Whitewater Valley traded to Cincinnati. The 
trade of the southern part of the State flowed to the Ohio, 
but one could not say whether Madison, New Albany, or 
Evansville would secure the larger portion. New Orleans 
was the final market, and boatmen shipped indifferently 
from a dozen river-board ports — Vevay, Jeffersonville, 
Leavenworth, and Troy sharing the trade with their larger 
rivals.'- Back from the river small centers of popula- 
tion and business, and especially of politics, were growing 
up at Brookville, Lexington, Charlestown, Salem, Bedford, 
Bono, Paoli, and Princeton. Vincennes, Terre Haute, La- 
fayette, and Logansport were the Wabash towns. Craw- 
fordsville, the "town in the big flat woods," was the greatest 
land market in the United States. There was little com- 
merce at this time at Indianapolis, while Muncietown, An- 
dersontown, Delphi, Peru, and Wabash were blooming out 
from struggling villages into pretentious county seats. 
Seven out of ten towns chosen as locations of the branches 
of the bank were on the borders of the State; only six of 
the ten contained over two thousand people each. The 
population of the State was about 500,000. There were 
about 900 merchants resident in the State, and perhaps an 
equal number of nonresident traders operating on the Ohio 
and Wabash. 

On the Ohio river the busy pork-packing season was 
in November and December, i"- Drovers traveled through 
the neighboring counties and bought up large droves of 
hogs. These were butchered on the river-board as soon as 
cold weather set in. The products were shipped to New 
Orleans in the early winter before the ice blocked the Ohio. 
Thus there was a good demand for money in that section 
in the fall. The produce of the Wabash was gathered in 
flat-boats from the smaller streams. The boatmen had to 
wait for the thaw in the spring, when the ice was gone, 
and there was plenty of water. This required capital in 
February and March, and the produce was realized on by 

1 1 Indiana Journal, Feb. 22, 1834. 

1-' Lanier. Sketch of Life of J. F. D. Lanier, 17. 

13 Indiana Journal, Feb. 22, 1834. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 401 



To St. Joaeph 



St. JoMpli 



Eltbart 







Indiana in 1833. By E. V. Shockley. 



402 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

June 1.^^ What little lake trade there was came in mid- 
summer. At this time the farmers of the interior were 
buying up hogs and cattle to fatten for the fall market. 

On January 30, the General Assembly chose Samuel 
Merrill, pension agent for the State, president of the 
bank for a term of five years. By May 10, all stock in 
the Indianapolis and Lawrenceburg branches was taken, 
and a meeting of directors was called for May 20, at 
which time all the branches had made returns showing full 
subscriptions. At a previous meeting of the bank board, 
February 13, the branches had been located. i' A loan of 
a half million dollars was effected by the loan agents of 
the State, the fund commissioners, August 6, and Governor 
Noble set November 19 as the day for the bank to open 
its doors for business. The total cost of organization had 
been $614.45, and this amount was more than offset by the 
premium received on the bonds issued. 

The bank was prosperous from the start. ^''' Men had 
subscribed for stock deliberately and there was little evi- 
dence of speculation. Taken as a whole its officers were 
beyond criticism. The Whig party controlled the State 
and kept Samuel Merrill at the head of the bank till 1843. 
Then his place was taken by a worthy successor, Judge 
James Morrison, who held office till the Whigs again gained 
control, ten years later, and placed Ebenezer Dumont in 
charge. These men, by the policy they established, placed 
the bank on a firm foundation in the confidence of the 
people.^" 

14 Will. F. Hnnlin.ii, "The State Biink of Infli;iu;i.'' a thirty-six i)a£:e 
article in the Joiinidl of Political Econonni. Dec. 1S05. 

15 Indiana Joiinml. Feb. 22. 1834. Also Journal of the Indiana Hlatc 
Senate, 1834. 59. Also Bank Rei)ort-<. I, \). 1. The aiiiuial repoi-ts were 
made by the cashier of the State Bank, to the legislature, and were due 
in November. J. M. Ray was cashier duriiiir the entire life of the bank. 
The branches were located as follows: The first at Indianapoli.s. second 
at Lawrenceburg, third at Richmond, fourth at Madison, tifth at New 
Albany, sixth at Evausville, seventh at Vincennes. eighth at Bedford, 
ninth at Terre Haute, tenth at Lafayette, eleventh at Fort Wayne, 
twelfth at South Bend, thirteenth at .Michigan City. 

i6Brt»A- Reports, II (1835). 1 ff. 

1' Harding, The State Bank of Indiana, 12. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 403 

§ 74 The Panic of 1837 

The bank passed through two severe trials. The first 
of these grew out of the internal improvement activity 
which began in 1836. While both the bank and the inter- 
nal improvements were closely allied ventures of the State, 
their affairs were kept separate as far as possible. The 
improvement officials kept their funds in the bank and fre- 
quently overdrew their accounts. When the State failed 
in its payments, in 1839, the bank was involved by one of 
these overdrafts to the amount of $650,000, which seriously 
crippled it. In 1836 the fund commissioners of the State 
had been authorized to sell bonds and procure for the bank 
$1,000,000 more of capital, but through dealings with a 
corrupt bankrupt concern in New York all was lost but 
$20,000. There was a great demand at the time for loans 
and, depending on the extra capital, the bank had dis- 
counted heavily. The failure to secure the extra capital, 
coupled with the failure of the State, came near breaking 
the bank, and caused several branches to stop discounting 
for the time and call in all their loans. The State came 
to its aid' in 1840 and issued bank scrip to the amount of 
$722,640, which it gave the bank to pay the overdraft. 

The second trial of the bank's strength came in the 
Panic of 1837. Its deposits had risen rapidly from the 
start. The United States deposit was $1,062,238 in 1835, 
and the next year it rose to $2,267,489. In 1837, however, 
the United States deposit dropped sharply to $576,277 and 
disappeared entirely by 1840. President Jackson's specie 
circular of July 6, 1836, also helped to weaken the bank 
at this period by forcing the government land offices to 
refuse all kinds of bank notes. Its "quick" liabilities No- 
vember 26, 1836, were: public deposits, $2,276,357; indi- 
vidual deposits, $431,703; notes in circulation, $1,927,050; 
capital stock, $1,585,481 ; assets, specie, not given but about 
$1,000,000; discounts, $3,176,613; currency, $1,204,737. 

It was well that the three years of experience had taught 
the people the value of the bank. The stages which reached 
Indianapolis on Thursday evening, May 20, 1837, from 



404 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Lawrenceburg and Madison, brought the news that all the 
eastern banks, including the old Bank of the United States, 
had suspended specie payment. The news was as sudden 
as it was unexpected. The situation was grave. If the 
bank suspended specie payment it would forfeit its char- 
ter. If it did not suspend, it would be broken and thus 
ruin the business of the State. The bank board was fortu- 
nately in session, and, in spite of the law, immediately or- 
dered all branches to stop paying specie.^"- The most dan- 
gerous creditor of the bank was the national government, 
which had $1,500,000 in specie on deposit. Mr. Lanier was 
posted off at once with $80,000 in gold to see what terms 
could be made with Secretary of the Treasury Woodbury. 
Lanier went by boat to Wheeling, thence by stage to Freder- 
ick, thence by the Baltimore & Ohio railroad to Washington. 
His mission was entirely successful. Of all the banks then 
possessing government deposits, the Indiana bank was the 
only one that offered, or paid any specie. The secretary 
allowed the deposit to remain till drawn in the regular 
course of business.!*^ It is also very creditable to the bank 
that its bills were regularly received by creditors of the 
nation. Nearly every bank in the west and southwest broke 
under this strain, and also many in the east. The Indiana 
bank, alone, west of the Alleghanies, did not fail. The 
Whigs attributed the general disaster to Jackson's war on 
the Bank of the United States, aided and aggravated by 
the Specie Circular.-" 

The citizens of Indianapolis helped the local situation 
by approving in a public meeting the action of the bank 
board. The merchants of Indianapolis showed their faith 
in the bank and its directors by giving notice promptly 
that they would receive State bank notes of all branches 
at par and by expressing in another resolution full confi- 
dence in the bank. In its turn the bank board issued an 

is//u//«wa Joiinial. May 20. 1837. 

19 Lanier. Life of Lanier, 15. 

20 Indiann Journal. May 6. 1S37. "Iiuliaii.i. iu 1837. li;^(l Ihe largest 
amount of circulation and of specie in proportion to its capital, of any 
state in the Union." Geurg:e Tucker. The Theory of Money and Bank.-i. 
etc. (Boston. 1839.) 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 405 

address to the people of the State calling attention to the 
fact that the bank must, in self defense, close its doors 
against specie payment. Agents were in the State from 
the east who would take away specie by the wagon load, 
by means of the bank's own currency. The bank had on 
deposit in eastern banks $1,000,000 in its own notes which 
could all be used to draw from the various branches the 
$1,000,000 in specie which was in their vaults. The branches 
would continue to receive paper currency at par and cancel 
all indebtedness. The people were warned not to sacrifice 
their money. The people preserved their confidence and 
the bank preserved their money. The suspension was not 
forced, but was the result of due deliberation. The bank 
reported, and actually had, plenty of specie, A committee 
of the General Assembly made a thorough investigation 
and approved its conduct. 

A meeting of bankers from all parts of the country was 
called for April, 1838. John Lanier was again called on to 
represent the Indiana bank. The bankers met in New 
York, and Lanier surprised the eastern members by mak- 
ing a proposal, in which Albert Gallatin concurred, in favor 
of immediate resumption of specie payment. He succeeded 
in his mission and set August 13, 1838, as the day on 
which the banks were to begin again the payment of specie. 
But the banks still feared the specie would all be gathered 
in the east, and on November 19, 1839, the State bank 
again closed its specie vaults, not to reopen them until or- 
dered to do so by the General Assembly, June 15, 1842. 
The bank never defaulted again. No other State in the 
Union passed through this period with its currency so 
little deranged. 

There was much criticism of the bank during this pe- 
riod of suspension. The bank notes were at a discount of 
about five per cent outside the State. This was an especial 
hardship on merchants. One of the most lucrative fields 
of the bank's activity was the purchase and sale of ex- 
change. Bills on New Orleans were bought from shippers 
in the fall and winter. When these were about to mature, 
Lanier would go to New Orleans and cash them, using 

(27) 



406 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the proceeds in buying exchange on New York and other 
eastern cities. These bills were sold to Indiana merchants 
buying in the east and thus the bank turned its money at 
least three times a year. The discount on these bills, due 
largely to depreciated currency, was from eight to fifteen 
per cent on each transaction. During the panic the bank 
made ten to fifteen per cent clear profits.^i It took advan- 
tage of its freedom from specie payment and expanded its 
note circulation from thirty to forty per cent. 

The report of November, 1840, shows that directors had 
borrowed from the bank $430,802; other stockholders, 
$907,797; thus a total of $1,338,599 of its outstanding 
debts was against its own stockholders. All other loans 
amounted to only $2,339,819.-- It was to this condition 
that President Merrill alluded when he said many officers 
of the bank sought the positions only to enable themselves 
to borrow money. If we add to this amount the $692,433 
owed by the State and a suspended debt of over half a 
million, we realize what a burden the bank was carrying. 
It had in suit for collection at this time also about $200,- 
000, most of which had to be collected from sureties. 

This, however, was the ebb in the bank's career. Re- 
cuperation was as rapid as demoralization had been. Its 
large suspended debt was nearly all collected, and from this 
point onward the prosperity of the bank was steady. The 
flood of gold in 1849-50 brought life to all avenues of busi- 
ness, and the "hard times" of 1837-43 were speedily for- 
gotten. 

Looking back over the whole history of the State Bank 
of Indiana, one is compelled to say that it was successful. 
Its success is the more striking because it stands against 
the sordid background of "wildcat" banking. Its career 
fell largely in that most unhappy period of our history 
called the Panic Era of 1837, and it surely had little in its 
favor as far as the era was concerned. It was, for- 
tunately, well on its feet when this panic prostrated busi- 
ness throughout the United States. Although it did not 

21 Lanier, Life of Lanier, 17. 

22 Documentary Journal, 1840, 94. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 407 

earn large dividends during that period, it protected itself 
better and took better care of its customers than any other 
bank in the west and did equally as well as any bank in 
the nation. It had scarcely weathered the panic when it 
found itself a creditor of a failing State to the extent of over 
one-third of its capital stock. The sinister hand of party 
politics is seen here and there, though never deadly except 
in the Constitutional Convention of 1851 and in the Free 
Banking Law of 1852. One is tempted to reflect that Jef- 
fersonian politics and laissez-faire economics never won a 
more regrettable victory than when they overthrew the 
State Bank of Indiana.^s 

One of the arguments used by the advocates of the bank 
charter of 1834 was that the dividends of the bank would 
pay the ordinary expenses of the State. A comparison of 
the statistics will show that the dividends ran low during 
the decade from 1838 to 1848. During a part of this time 
it had to suspend specie payments and curtail discounts, 
especially on eastern bills, on which it made most money. 
The dividends from 1843-45 inclusive ran low, because over 
$700,000 of the bank's money was tied up in suspended 
debts. Again in 1852 the State's expenses ran high, on 
account of the State Constitutional Convention of 1850. 
It must also be kept in mind that during this latter period 
the bank was piling up in its vaults a surplus of over 
$1,000,000, besides carrying $300,000 of suspended debt. 
The dividends — after paying interest on the borrowed capi- 
tal at five per cent — amounted to about $2,000,000 for the 
twenty-one years. Add to this amount a surplus of $1,434,- 
000, a suspended debt of $216,000, which was practically 
all collected, and banking property worth $100,000, and 
the total earnings of the bank for the twenty-one years 
were about three and three-fourths millions. The ordinary 

23 See Charles A. Conant's A History of Modern Banks of Issue (4th 
Ed., N. Y., 1909), 386; A. M. Davis's Origin of the National Banking 
System (Senate Doc. No. 582, 61st Congress, 2nd Sess.). For a similar 
experience see Charles Hunter Gamett's State Banks of Issue (Uni- 
versity of Illinois, 1898). 



408 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

expenses of the State for the same period were about 
$1,800,000, or just about one-half of the dividends. 

A criticism of the bank, frequently heard from the be- 
ginning and growing more frequent throughout the twenty 
years, was that it failed to supply an adequate currency 
for the growing commerce of the State. That this criticism 
was just, will be seen by comparing the capital stock, dis- 
counts, and circulation statistics with the number of polls, 
acres of land assessed, and the total valuation of State 
property. The wealth of the State mounted by regular 
steps, while the capital of the bank, its circulation, and its 
discounts never appreciably increased. In 1836 the circu- 
lation was $2,000,000, when the polls numbered 75,000, the 
acres taxed numbered 5,000,000, and the total property was 
valued at $67,000,000. In 1854 the circulation was only 
$3,500,000 when the polls were 160,000, the acres 20,000,- 
000, and the taxables near $300,000,000. This comparison 
needs no further comment. The disparity worked a great 
hardship and injustice on the debtor class, and this class 
formed a large majority of the people. 

§ 75 The Era of Free Banks 

While the commercial interests maintained a firm 
faith in the integrity of the State Bank, there gradually 
grew up a sentiment of opposition. The reasons for this 
sentiment were not clearly defined, yet the sentiment was 
strong enough to control the General Assembly, and espe- 
cially did it dominate the Constitutional Convention of 
1850-51. When a proposition to extend the State Bank 
charter was before the Convention of 1850 only one of 
its original supporters, Othniel Clark, voted for it.^^ 

The "hard money" Democrats, who in 1834 had been 
only an insignificant minority, had increased in numbers 

^2 De'bates of the Constitutional Convention of Indiana, 1850-51, 1995. 
These Debates are printed in two large volumes, paged consecutively. 
This work is referred to hereafter as Debates. The discussion here 
given is based entirely on the Debates. Where specific reference is not 
given, any fact may be found readily by use of the excellent index of 
that work. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 409 

till they held the balance of power in 1850. These men, 
however, were not inflationists. The strong current of 
public opinion opposed to the State bank came from the in- 
flationists — the men who wanted more money in circulation. 

Their chief objections to the State Bank were: (1) It 
had failed to supply enough currency. (2) It had been 
partial in lending money to its stockholders, and it had 
also favored farmers and stock buyers as against mer- 
chants, (3) It had refused its assent to the location of 
new branches, when business clearly demanded them. (4) 
It had suspended specie payment twice, and had not re- 
sumed payment the last time till the State forced it. (5) It 
had used its power as a monopoly and had almost defied 
the State government. (6) As all sound banks must do, it 
had made enemies of the large numbers of those who 
wanted credit and could not give sufficient security. 

On the other hand the teachings of Jackson were 
against paper currency, State banks, and monopolies. Many 
Whigs were opposed to paper money and voted against the 
bank, and some Democrats, like Hendricks, favored it. The 
demand for more money is always popular and crept out 
in nearly every speech in favor of free banks. It is to be 
pointed out that the conditions of business, and the needs 
of the day, had more to do with forming the opinion of 
the convention than an intelligent, statesmanlike under- 
standing of banking. 

The thirty-sixth session of the General Assembly met 
December 1, 1851. The new constitution had been in op- 
eration one month when, on January 3, 1852, William Z. 
Stewart of Cass county moved that a select committee of 
one from each judicial district be appointed to report a 
free, or general, banking bill. 

On January 12, Chairman John W. Spencer of Ohio and 
Switzerland counties presented the report of the regular 
committee on banks. This was in response to a resolution 
of the House to inquire into the necessity of enacting a gen- 
eral banking law. A majority of the committee favored 
such an act, and recommended the following restrictions: 



410 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

(1) All issues of currency were to be secured by an equal 
amount of United States, or State stocks, and all banks 
were required to keep on hand in specie twenty-five per 
cent of their note circulation. (2) Two-thirds of the se- 
curities might consist of stock, one-third of real estate 
mortgages. (3) A slight discrimination should be made 
in favor of Indiana bonds. (4) No bank should have less 
than $25,000 capital. The committee asked that this report 
be referred to the select committee on banking. ^^ 

February 9, 1852, Mr. Stewart of the select committee 
reported a bill for general banking.^^ It was similar to the 
New York banking law of 1838. The bill was put on its 
passage April 30, and failed by a vote of 25 for and 20 
against — lacking one of a constitutional majority. It was 
revived by a motion to reconsider, and on May 18, was 
passed by a vote of 27 to 18.'*^ Party lines were not strictly 
drawn in passing the bill, but in general the Democrats 
favored and the Whigs opposed. Governor Wright ap- 
proved the bill, but was not enthusiastic in its support. 
The act was to take effect July 1, 1852. 

The general features of the law have been indicated. 
The State auditor was to be comptroller, issue all bills, and 
keep all plates. Notes were to run from one dollar up to 
five hundred in the ordinary denominations. Not over one- 
fourth of the whole amount was to be less than five dollar 
notes, and the banks were not to handle notes less than 
five dollars issued outside the State. Notes were to be regis- 
tered, counted, and countersigned by the auditor, who also 
stamped them "secured by the pledge of public stocks." 
Circulation was guaranteed by a deposit of United States, 
Indiana, or other State bonds equal to Indiana fives. The 
State was in nowise pledged to redeem the currency. Specie 
equal in amount to twelve per cent of the circulation had 
to be kept on hand by the banks, and specie payment must 
never be refused on penalty of having the bank closed at 

'i^ House Journal, 1851, I, 425. 

44 House Journal, 1851, I, 803. 

45 Senate Journal, 1851, 1018. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 411 

once. Reports were to be made semi-annually to the State 
auditor.^^ 

The plan looked plausible, and its authors were proud 
of the law. There may have been some who were inflii- 
enced by selfish motives, but the method of its passage can- 
not be criticized. By December 15, 1852, six months after 
the law went into force, fifteen banks had been organized, 
and are examples of the seventy-four that followed.^^ These 
had deposited $910,000 worth of stocks face value, and had 
received currency to the amount of $800,000. They were 
only an earnest of the deluge. Six of the banks were said 
to be doing a legitimate local business. Five had put their 
notes in circulation at New York. No notes had been issued 
to four of them at the date of the report, December 15, 
1852.48 Either State Auditor Ellis felt that he had no au- 
thority under the law to restrain the establishment of 
banks, or else he had no inclination to do so. Governor 
Wright was inclined to think the latter was the case. In 
his message of January 7, 1853, the governor, for the first 
time, mentioned the subject of free banking.^^ Although 
he had signed the bill, he had not recommended it in any 
previous message. Like many others at that time, he rec- 
ognized the insufficiency of the circulating medium, and the 
inability or refusal of the State Bank to meet this need. 
The governor was, however, quick to see the failure of the 
new law. The restrictions were entirely inadequate. Al- 
ready five banks, of the "Owl Creek" kind, with only a 
nominal existence, and a capital of $365,000, had been or- 
ganized. These bankers, he thought, had no idea of re- 
deeming their notes. The pledge of the State would give 
their notes circulation, and an unnatural expansion of the 
currency must result. At one time it would rob the cred- 
itor, at another time, the debtor. Under the present sys- 
tem, he thought, there could never be a sound currency. 
The speculator came to Indianapolis with a bundle of bonds 

46 Laws of Indiana, 1852. 

47 Documentary Journal, 1853, 98. 

48 Documentary Journal, 1853, 150. 

49 Senate Journal, 1853. 



412 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

under one arm and a roll of bank notes under the other. 
He deposited his bonds, that had cost him from fifteen to 
fifty cents on the dollar, and got for them Indiana cur- 
rency, dollar for dollar, recommended by the State. Pre- 
sumably he went to some obscure place and put them in 
circulation, but in reality he took them to New York. The 
Constitutional Convention and the General Assembly of 
1851 had, in fact, invited the bondholders to bring their 
bonds to Indianapolis and cash them at par, and, perhaps, 
for a few years draw interest on both the bonds deposited 
and the currency received. 

The natural result followed hard on this unnatural ex- 
pansion of the currency. About May 1, 1854, a flurry in 
the money market started the trouble. The Crimean War 
in Europe changed the demand for American securities to 
a demand for American coin. Coin was at a premium, and 
brokers began to drain the Indiana banks to get coin for 
the eastern markets. Governor Wright had suspected the 
integrity of these banks from the first and, in 1854, had 
sent John S. Tarkington to a bank at Newport in Vermillion 
county to see if it would redeem its paper. As it was ex- 
pressed at the time, the bank "squatted." This test not 
only confirmed the governor in his suspicion, but started a 
run on the free banks of the State that never ceased. It 
was charged at the time that State Bank men furnished 
the governor with all the bills he wanted on the free 
banks.^*^ 

During this bank-run the State Bank paid out over 
$2,500,000 in specie without lowering its specie deposit. 
Business could not be carried on under such conditions. 
One instance must suffice as an example of the violent fluc- 
tuations of the period. The circulation of the free banks 
in May, 1854, was $9,000,000. By December 15, $3,454,279 
of circulation had been withdrawn. People lost all confi- 
dence in free banks, but still the auditor felt that a few 
amendments to the law would make it a good banking 
system. 

50 Berry R. Sulgrove, History of Indianapolis, 143. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 413 

In the midst of this panic in the money market the Gen- 
eral Assembly met, January 4, 1855. Governor Wright 
again took up the cudgels for a sound currency.^^ He re- 
peated his statement of two years before that the free 
bank law was a failure, and that the past events had shown 
clearly that the restrictions provided in that law were en- 
tirely insufficient to prevent the abuses of the banking 
privileges. By January 25, 1855, there had been organized 
ninety-one free banks with a total nominal capital of 
$9,502,330 and an outstanding circulation at the time of 
$4,581,833, backed by deposited bonds, whose par value was 
$4,941,515. The money of the State was never so deranged 
as when the thirty-eighth session of the General Assembly 
met. As soon as H. E. Talbott became auditor, he stopped 
the issue of bills, but the cancellation went on and the con- 
sequent contraction of the circulating medium continued.^^ 

The legislature was deeply disappointed in the disas- 
trous failure of the law. Of course the system had in it 
all the weaknesses of banking systems not founded on liquid 
assets. But these weaknesses do not account for its quick 
and ruinous collapse. Had an efficient auditor administered 
the law and enforced it rigidly, such banks as that of New- 
port could not have been organized. The chief defect lay, 
not in the law, but in the officials who failed to enforce it. 

§ 76 Bank of the State of Indiana — The Third State 
Bank, 1855-1865 

The bill to charter a new State bank to be known as 
the Bank of the State of Indiana had a career in the Gen- 
eral Assembly very similar to that of the Free Bank Bill, 
though the opposition to it was more spirited and the lobby 
for it more powerful. It passed the senate, February 24, 
1855, under the call of the previous question, by the close 
vote of 27 to 22.53 The minority joined in a bitter protest 

51 Senate Journal, 1855, 17, the governor's message. Documentary 
Journal, 1855, 82. 

52 Documentary Journal, 1855, 934. 

53 Senate Journal, 1855, 551. 



414 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

which they spread upon the journals. ^^ After passing the 
house, the bill met with the governor's veto. His principal 
objections were, that he had not had sufficient time to ex- 
amine the bill ; that the bank could issue unlimited paper ; 
that the measure, which might almost ruin the State, was 
not discussed in the legislature; that the bill exempted the 
bank from most of the burdens of taxation ; that the man- 
ner of subscribing its capital was unfair and invited cor- 
ruption; that it could discount paper equal to three times 
its capital stock, plus three times its deposits ; that its title, 
The Bank of the State of Indiana, was adopted to mislead 
people; that the State could have no control over it, under 
the charter, which was to run twenty years ; and that the 
whole atmosphere of this bill, from its introduction to its 
last vote, was charged with uncertainty and a suspicion 
of corruption and unfairness. The senate passed the bill 
over the veto by a vote of 30 to 20.^^ 

The above are the facts around which was woven one 
of the most noted legislative scandals of the State's history. 

54 Senate Journal, 1855, 562. 

55 The majority vote in the Senate on the four occasions is here given : 

1. Passage of a Bill to Establish a Bank with Branches : — Alexander, 
Brown, Burke, Combs, Crane, Cravens, Crouse, Drew, Ensey, Freeland, 
Griggs, Harris, Helm, Jackson of Tipton, Meeker, Parker, Reynolds, 
Richardson of St. Joseph, Shields, Spann, Suit, Tarkington, Weston, 
Williams, Wilson, Witherow, Woods; — 27 in all. 

2. Passage of Free Bank Bill : — Alexander, Anthony, Brookshire, 
Brown, Burke, Chapman, Combs, Crane, Cravens, Crouse, Drew, Ensey, 
Freeland, Glazebrook, Griggs, Harris, Hawthorn, Helm, Hendry, Hos- 
brook, Jackson of Madison, Jackson of Tipton. Knightley, Mansfield, 
Mathes, Meeker, Parker, Reynolds. Richardson of St. Joseph, Richard- 
son of Spencer, Robinson, Rugg, Sage, Shook, Spann, Suit, Tarkington, 
Vandeventer, Weston, Williams, Wilson, Witherow, Woods; — 43 in all. 

3. Passage of the Free Bank Bill over the veto : — Alexander, An- 
thony, Brown, Burke, Chapman, Combs, Crane, Cravens, Crouse, Drew, 
Ensey, Freeland, Griggs, Harris, Hawthorn, Helm. Hendrick, Hosbrook, 
Jackson, Knightley, Meeker, Parker, Reynolds, Richardson of St. Joseph, 
Robinson, Rugg, Sage, Spann, Suit, Tarkington, Vandeventer, Weston, 
Williams, Wilson, Witherow, Woods; — 36 in all. 

4. Passage over the veto of a Bill to Establish a Bank with Branch- 
es : — Alexander, Anthony, Brown. Burke, Combs, Cravens, Crane, Crouse, 
Drew, Ensey, Freeland, Griggs, Harris, Helm, Hostetler, Jackson of Tip- 
ton, Meeker, Parker, Reynolds, Richardson of St. Joseph, Robinson, 
Shields, Spann, Suit, Tarkington, Weston, Williams, Wilson, Witherow, 
Woods :— 30 in all. 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 415 

The smallest majority was that on the first passage of 
the bill to charter the Bank of the State of Indiana. All 
of the twenty-seven senators who supported this bill also 
supported the Free Bank Bill. It was an allied majority 
that ruled the Assembly. The vote is the more surprising 
because the bills provide for entirely distinct systems of 
banking. The Bank of the State of Indiana is, as the gov- 
ernor pointed out, a misnomer. It was not a State bank, 
but one of the worst forms of an unrestricted bank. The 
only guaranty of its integrity was its mutual liability and 
the character of its stockholders and officers. 

The bill, as it was introduced, provided for three 
grafts."*' The first consisted in selling the State Bank 
stock at a price to be named by the lobby and paid for with 
bonds bought at 90 and turned in at 100. This met with 
the most violent opposition and had to be dropped later. 

The second was in locating the branches, in which the 
new board of bank commissioners had full power. This 
board of commissioners, named in the second section of 
the bill, was composed of Thomas L. Smith of New Albany, 
Andrew L. Osborn of Laporte, Jehu T. Elliott of New- 
castle, Addison L. Roach of Rockville, and John D. Defrees 
of Indianapolis. It is but fair to state that Mr. Defrees 
took no part in the work after he ascertained the pur- 
pose of the lobbyists. It is not necessary to comment on the 
personnel of this board. All were prominent men and all 
had been highly honored by the people in an official way. 
There was no excuse for their conduct. They were to get 
their pay for lobbying by selling the locations of the branch 
banks. The commissioners were also empowered to ap- 
point two subcommissioners to open the books for each 
branch and receive subscriptions. 

The third opportunity for graft was in subscribing the 
stock of the bank. The law directed that the subcommis- 

56 Bank Frauds, 41. This document of the legislative session of 1857 
contains the evidence heard by, and the findings of, a joint committee 
appointed at the suggestion of Governor Wright to investigate the char- 
tering of the Bank of the State of Indiana. The report contains the tes- 
timony of most of the lobbyists and of members of the session of 1855. 
It has a good index. 



416 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

sioners should open the books to receive subscriptions 
between nine and twelve o'clock. The commissioners were 
careful to appoint subcommissioners who would allow no 
one to subscribe except those recommended by the lobbyists. 
The charter was worth $500,000, at a fair estimate, basing 
the estimate on the dividend paying power of the old bank. 

Several lawsuits followed the organization of the bank, 
but the real merits of the case, with the State as a party, 
were never brought before the supreme court. Nor would 
it, presumably, have availed anything. Courts naturally 
hesitate to question the integrity of a coordinate branch 
of the government. 

No further changes in the bank laws were made till the 
law of 1874 was enacted, under which the State banks of 
today operate. The national law of 1863 as amended in 
1866 stopped all State banks from issuing currency, and 
effectually put an end to experiments in banking, though 
it has not solved the greater question of the inflation and 
contraction of the currency. 

The new Bank of the State of Indiana gathered itself 
together after the storm and began to do a careful, con- 
servative banking business. The people soon came to look 
upon the whole winter campaign as a war among highway- 
men, in which, for the moment, the lobbyists had got the 
upper hand of the old bank men. 

Hugh McCulloch of Fort Wayne was elected president, 
and James M. Ray, cashier. Branches were established at 
Lima, Laporte, Plymouth, South Bend, Fort Wayne, La- 
fayette, Logansport, Indianapolis, Richmond, Connersville, 
Rushville, Madison, Jeffersonville, New Albany, Bedford, 
Vincennes, Terre Haute, Muncie, and Lawrenceburg. The 
bank opened with $197,903 paid-in capital, and $35,497 in 
specie, an average for each branch of $10,000 capital, and 
less than $2,000 in specie. It was on a level with the worst 
"wildcat" banks in all its essential features save two. Its 
branches were mutually responsible, and it was in the hands 
of the most capable business men in Indiana. Its president 
was one of the three or four greatest American financiers. 
The bank prospered until overwhelmed by the national bank 



SECOND STATE BANK OF INDIANA 417 

system. Under an act of the General Assembly of 1865, 
it closed up its business. Nearly all the branches became 
national banks. Its last report, for the year 1864, shows 
how the national currency was affecting its circulation. At 
the close of 1862, it had $5,000,000 in circulation, and at 
the close of 1864 only $1,500,000. 



CHAPTER XVIII 
the pioneers and their social life 

§ 77 The People 

The present population of Indiana, like that of all other 
American States, is a compound of the civilized nations of 
earth. The predominating strain in this population is the 
English, Scotch and Irish peasantry. Along the eastern 
foothills of the Appalachians these immigrants from 
Great Britain mingled and fused into a class with pretty 
well defined characteristics. They were of the substantial 
stock of English yeomanry, the stubborn, independent stock 
that has made the English soldier and the English colonist 
successful in all parts of the world. 

The second generation of these folk occupied the high 
valleys of the mountains from Carlisle and Pittsburg to the 
Watauga and Holston. Wherever they settled they built 
States and established institutions. The third generation, 
generally speaking, pushed on across the mountains, es- 
tablishing boroughs or forts at Limestone, Louisville, 
Bryants, Crab Orchard, Boonesborough and Harrodsburg, 
many of them pressing on to Vincennes and Kaskaskia. 
In numerous instances brothers and sisters parted in the 
eastern valleys, and their children met as cousins in Ken- 
tucky, one branch of the family having come by Tennessee 
and the Wilderness Road, the other by Pittsburg and the 
Ohio river. The fourth generation, about a century after 
their ancestors came from abroad, crossed the Ohio river 
into Indiana and Illinois, or crossed the Mississippi river 
4i:':o Missouri and Arkansas. 

The language of this group of pioneers was the lan- 
guage of the eighteenth century commoner of England. By 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 419 

calling it a Hoosier dialect, we would claim among the earli- 
est Hoosiers, Pope, who made "join" rhyme with "divine," 
and Bums, who invariably, in the full tide of his songs, 
"draps" the final "g" in all present active participles. 

But how, it may be asked, did it happen that a people 
would get a century behind in their language? A group 
of people in the heart of a wilderness continent late in the 
nineteenth century speaking the language of the early 
eighteenth century peasants sounds like an anachronism. 
The explanation is at hand. When this people settled in 
the back country of America they tore themselves away 
from the culture of England, they separated themselves 
from the ordinary channels of commercial life, and virtually 
went into exile. The long, century struggle with the wil- 
derness and its inhabitants engrossed their whole attention 
and energy. When they could snatch a moment's rest from 
the battle they did pitch their tents and endeavor to repro- 
duce English institutions, but the lure of the wilderness 
was too strong. 

The thirst for education was continually upon them. 
Witness the founding of Washington College at Salem, 
Tennessee; Transylvania in Kentucky, Vincennes in In- 
diana, to name only a few. During this whole century this 
energetic folk, impressionable, wide-awake, free, in a 
strange country, retained its language almost entirely by 
memory. The usual library among the pioneers was the 
Bible, the King James translation. 

It was a homogeneous group of people. Their preach- 
ers, their lawyers, their orators, all those who are sup- 
posed to influence language, were part and kindred of all 
the rest. There were very few newspapers and they had 
a very limited circulation. It is worth noting, however, 
that there is little trace of dialect in any newspaper. 

Whether this is due to the typesetters, who used a book, 
or whether it is a. case of a written and spoken language 
existing side by side does not appear conclusively at pres- 
ent. However, there is abundant evidence that the latter 
explanation is the proper one. There is no doubt that such 



420 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

eloquent pioneers as Clay, Cass, Lincoln, Cartwright, and 
Asbury spoke the picturesque native language of their fore- 
fathers. 

The term Hoosier dialect is a misnomer. So far as it 
can be said to have any justification, it is in connection with 
the southern element of our population. Whatever pecu- 
liarity there may be in it is common to one-third of the na- 
tion, and a characteristic so common cannot be said to be 
very singular. ^ 

The social customs of early Indiana are most clearly un- 
derstood in the light of their history. Scarcely a feature 
of their early life but expressed itself earlier in Kentucky, 
Tennessee, Virginia or the Carolinas, and many customs 
and conventions were brought from over seas. 

The charivari, the Christmas shooting, the maltreating 
of the schoolmaster, the drinking and gambling, the tavern, 
the shooting match, the election day, the wedding and in- 
fare, the log-rolling, the quilting, the camp-meeting, all 
smack of the "old South" and "merrie Englande." 

The open-handed hospitality, which regarded it almost 
an insult for a man to offer to pay for meals or lodging, the 
quick sense of honor, which resented more keenly a reflec- 
tion on one's integrity than a physical assault, the con- 
tempt for business shrewdness or close bargaining, the 
quick temper, the explosive humor, the wide humanity, the 
philosophic as opposed to the scientific mind, the deep 
thought in the homely expression — these are some of the 
mental characteristics of this people. 

Thorough-going democracy, freedom from all restraint, 
elbow room, believers in Christianity though careless of 
creeds and forms, simplicity in dress and houses, careless- 
ness of accumulated wealth, life above property, neglectful- 
ness of business, enjoyment of plain society and discussion, 
rarely calling into action their great reserve power, on easy 
terms with the world, believing that the consequences of 

1 Lois Kimball Matthews, The Expansion of New England, 197; 
Meredith Nicholson, The Boosters, ch. I. The text is based on a wide 
study of early Indiana newspapers. 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 421 

one's deeds return to the doer — these are some of the lead- 
ing principles of their philosophy of life. 

They believed and practiced a community of work, but 
there was an individual score kept. The man who did not 
help his neighbor roll logs received no help in return, unless 
on account of charity. No people were ever more chari- 
table. They borrowed and loaned with the greatest free- 
dom everything from a team and wagon down to a set of 
pewter spoons. Yet there was little partnership in the own- 
ership of property. Each family lived to itself and had no 
great desire to have near neighbors.^ 

§ 78 Home Life and Customs 

The pioneer located his home with little regard to any- 
thing but a supply of good water. Southern Indiana was 
well supplied with springs, and each pioneer home was 
near one. 

The style of the house depended on two factors — the 
time of the settler's arrival and the character of the man. 
Usually the settler came on ahead of his family, planted 
his crop and then proceeded to build a good cabin. If he 
preferred hunting to work, or took the ague, or if his 
family came with him, he usually lived a year or two in a 
half-faced camp. 

The half-faced camp was a log pen with three sides 
and a covering of brush. Sometimes a large log or a shel- 
tering rock served for a back wall. The front, usually fac- 
ing the south, was closed by a curtain or hung with skins. 
In front of this open side the fire was built and the cook- 
ing done. The ground was covered with skins and furs. 
Such a house did very well in dry, warm weather when 
no real shelter was needed. It was considered a makeshift 
by the pioneers and only occasionally resorted to. 

2 The best discussions of this subject are in the writings of Edward 
Eggleston, Meredith Nicholson, and James Whitcomb Riley. From the 
historical standpoint F. J. Turner. Rise of the New West, is the best 
discussion available. A book just from the press, In My Youth (author 
unknown), gives a good sympathetic picture of Quaker life in early In- 
diana. 

(28) 



422 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The simpler form of the log house was a four-sided pen 
made of rather small, round logs, which were notched into 
each other at the corners so that each log touched the one 
below. It is said the settlers from the east built their log 
houses square, while those from the south built theirs about 
twice as long as wide. The houses were covered with clap- 
boards about four feet long, held on by weight poles. A 
hole for a door was made by cutting out parts of about four 
logs. A wooden board or a skin closed the opening. At 
the end stood a mud and stick chimney, the framework 
made of sticks and then covered over with clay. 

The best form of the log house consisted of two pens 
made of hewed logs. The pens were separated by an entry 
about twelve feet wide, which served as a porch. A frame 
window and two stone chimneys with four fireplaces, two 
downstairs and two up, often added an air of luxury to the 
double log house. The floors were made of heavy punch- 
eons split from ash, walnut or poplar logs, pinned to the 
sleepers and dressed smooth with an adz. The taverns 
were generally of this style. 

In one corner, on a framework of poles, was the shuck 
or feather bed, soon replaced by a more comfortable feather 
bed, pieced quilts and the famous Carolina coverlets now 
highly prized as relics. In the opposite corner of the room 
was the table with its quaint tableware, part pewter, part 
gourd, part wooden, and all remarkable for their scarcity. 
A huge fireplace six to ten feet wide monopolized the op- 
posite end of the house, decorated with a semi-circle of 
three-legged stools. A trundle bed for the babies was hid 
away during the daytime under the big bed. The boys 
scampered up a pole ladder to sleep in the attic. Any num- 
ber of visitors could be accommodated by spreading the 
feather bed on the floor. Tradition leaves no doubt that 
this log cabin hospitality was genuine. 

There were not many cook stoves in pioneer Indiana. 
A few might have been found as early as 1820, after which 
they appeared in increasing numbers. Perhaps one family 
in five had a stove by 1840. The immigrant who trudged 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 423 

west on foot or came on horseback even was fortunate if 
he got through with a skillet and a pot. A spider skillet 
with lid and an earthen pot were more than the average 
cooking utensils possessed by a family. The meat was usu- 
ally cooked on a spit. Combread was baked in a small oven 
which, in reality, was a large skillet, if the family was for- 
tunate enough to possess one. If not, then Johnnycakes 
were baked on a board. If there was no board, the handle 
was taken out of the hoe and the metal covered with com 
dough and cooked. This was the famous hoecake. Practi- 
cally all bread was made of meal. All cooking was done 
over coals drawn out to the front of the fireplace. Some- 
times a crane was fixed in the side of the fireplace so that 
it could be swung on and off the fire at the convenience of 
the cook. 

As stated above, cornbread cooked in one of a dozen 
different ways was the staple food. Next came hominy and 
then some kind of meat. In the early days the most com- 
mon was venison and bear. Turkey and squirrel were not 
uncommon. In a few years chickens and hogs became plen- 
tiful ; later vegetables and fruit appeared on the table, the 
latter dried for winter use. The cooking was necessarily 
poor, and doubtless accounts for much of the sickness of 
that early period. 

The very first pioneers depended almost entirely on 
skins and furs for their clothing. The hunting-shirt, 
trousers, and moccasins were made of deer skins. A well- 
made suit with fringed coat, laced leggings and coonskin 
cap appeared well and was fairly comfortable in the warm, 
dry weather. When wet, it drew up to about one-half its 
usual dimensions, becoming cold and clammy. Soon linsey 
cloth took the place of skins, which, while more comfort- 
able, did not stand the rough wear like buckskin. All hailed 
with delight the time when they could lay aside both skins 
and linsey for the home-made woolen garments. A bear- 
skin overcoat, a beaver hat, a pair of buckskin gloves lined 
with squirrel fur, was considered good taste down till the 
Civil War. 



424 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Women wore plain dresses with an extra jacket in cold 
weather. The petticoat was usually of homespun. Woolen 
shawls were worn instead of coats. Hooks and eyes were 
used instead of buttons. On their heads they wore a sun- 
bonnet in summer, a knitted hood in winter. Shoe-packs 
were worn in winter and all went barefoot, men, women and 
children, in summer. Handkerchiefs and gloves were home- 
made, the former of cotton, the latter of squirrel skins. 

The children did not wear enough clothes in summer to 
warrant a description, the maximum being a long shirt 
hanging straight from the shoulders to the knees. In win- 
ter they dressed like their parents, the clothes being made 
on the same pattern and only slightly smaller. The pioneer 
boy in his everyday dress was a wonderfully skillful ma- 
chine, but the same boy dressed for a camp meeting, with 
starched shirt and brogan shoes, was the most woe-be-gone 
creature imaginable. 

About 1820 imported goods began to appear, such as 
broadcloths, brocades, taffetas and peau de soies. Beauti- 
ful furs, beaver hats, flounced skirts, balloon-shaped hoops, 
hats with a garden of flowers, cut-away coats with double- 
breasted checkered vests, silk stocks over hard buckram 
collars — such wore the gentlemen and ladies of the old 
school from 1830 to 1860. 

§ 79 Occupation 

The pioneers as a rule came to their western homes 
empty-handed. While raising their first crops they lived 
on game. Many of them made their first payments for 
their land with money obtained from pelts and venison 
hams. In their hunting they depended entirely on their 
dogs and flintlock rifles. The woods were full of game. 
Deer, bears, turkeys, pigeons, and wild ducks were plenti- 
ful. The deer were found in large numbers around the salt 
licks. Droves of them ventured into the wheatfields or 
cornfields. Wolves were a pest that preyed on sheep and 
hogs. 

Swarms of wild bees were numerous in the woods. They 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 425 

made their homes in hollow trees or clefts of the rocks. 
By watching the loaded bee, usually sprinkled with flour so 
that he might be seen as he made a "beeline" for home, the 
pioneer located the bee tree. He could either cut the tree 
at once or mark it. All pioneers respected a bee-hunter's 
mark. The tree was usually cut in September, if only the 
honey was wanted. It was cut earlier if it was desired to 
save the bees. 

The more serious work of the pioneer consisted in pre- 
paring his little home. He prospered just in proportion to 
the time he devoted to his farm. He found his land cov- 
ered with a heavy growth of oak, poplar, walnut, beech, 
gum, ash, maple, hickory and various other kinds of hard- 
wood timber. 

It was necessary to kill the trees so that sunshine might 
get through to the growing crop. The clearing might be 
made either by cutting and burning all the trees or by 
"deadening" the heavy timber. In either case the under- 
brush had to be cut, piled in heaps, and burned. Then the 
large trees were felled with an ax and cut into suitable 
lengths for rolling. The cuts were about twelve to twenty 
feet long. In some cases the logs were "niggered," that is, 
a smaller dry log was laid across the larger one and a fire 
kindled where they were in contact. In time the log was 
burned in two. The chopping in the clearing went on in- 
cessantly during the winter. In the spring, about the last 
of April, the settler was ready for the rolling. 

The "log-rolling" was almost an institution in Indiana 
for fifty years. All the men in the neighborhood, probably 
from twenty to fifty, gathered early in the day with axes 
and hand-spikes and piled the heavy logs in large heaps, 
three to ten logs in a heap, ready for burning. The men 
worked in "squads" of from ten to twenty each. There 
was both individual and team rivalry. Young bucks "pulled 
each other down" at the hand-spikes, while the squads 
worked to see who could work over the most ground or 
build the most heaps. 

After the logs were piled the young men spent a social 



(i> 



426 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

hour or two jumping or wrestling. While the men were 
rolling logs their wives and grown daughters were busy at 
the house, "quilting." The housewife usually had two or 
three quilts "pieced" for the occasion. One of these at a 
time was stretched in the quilting frames by which it was 
supported high enough to be convenient to the women sit- 
ting. The best quilters gathered around the four sides of 
the quilt while the others helped in preparing dinner and 
supper. The meals were a feature of the event. Every- 
thing good was prepared and all the tableware of the com- 
munity was borrowed for the table service. After the sup- 
per was over, a short time might be spent in dancing, but 
this was not common at log-rollings, both on account of the 
hard day's work and the necessity of changing clothes after 
handling the dirty logs. The number of log rollings in a 
community varied from twenty to forty. May was a hard 
month for the pioneer.^ 

If the settler had time, the easiest way to clear his land 
was to "deaden" the trees in July or August, let them stand 
two years before clearing. Many of them would then burn 
up as they stood. Such "deadenings" were to be seen on 
almost every farm. 

Many of the best cuts of oak, poplar, walnut and ash 
logs were left at the rolling to be split into rails for the 
fence. The "new ground," however, was usually fenced 
during the fall or winter. 

The plowing was done with a jumping shovel, of which 
the stock was wood and the point iron. An upright cutter 
stood just ahead of the point to jump it over roots. This 
was a modest implement and plowed where it could and 
jumped out where it couldn't. It had a reputation for kick- 
ing. When the point struck a root or rock the handles were 
thrown back violently, striking the unwary plowman just 
below the belt. The harrow was made entirely of wood. 

3 Those who are fond of telling of the good old days may try this 
program : Rise at 3 a. m.. "chunk up" ten acres of log-heaps before 
6 a. m., breakfast, walk three to ten miles, roll logs till 6 p. m., walk 
home, "chunk up" ten acres of log-heaps before going to bed. Repeat 
it thirty days in succession, rain or shine. 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 427 

If no harrow was handy, a "drag" made of brush did quite 
as well. The harness, single- and double-trees were the 
flimsiest. "Truck" wagons with solid wooden wheels were 
common. Oxen were used about as much as horses. Pitch- 
forks and spades were made of seasoned wood. The culti- 
vation was anything but satisfactory and the crops meager. 
Grain, except corn, was sown broadcast and "brushed in" 
with a light "drag." Corn responded best to this rough 
agriculture and creditable crops were raised. 

The early pioneers of the upper Mississippi Valley lived 
on corn. Roasting ears lasted from the first of August to 
the last of September. By that time the early corn was 
ready for the "gritter." By November, the first grists 
were ready for grinding. Cornbread and hominy were 
staples from then till spring, when garden vegetables took 
the place of the hominy. From corn was made the ever- 
present whiskey, without which nothing of consequence 
could be done. 

After the log-rolling season work on the farms was 
without excitement until the harvest season. Beginning 
with wheat, which ripened about June 20, the harvest sea- 
son lasted until the hay was in the mow, about August 1. 
Again there was a community of work. The harvesters 
gathered in groups of ten to twenty. The cradlers vied 
with each other in laying a straight, even swath and in not 
leaving a stalk of wheat standing. Then there was racing 
across the fields by the cradlers. When the field was done 
the "stubble call" was given. The housewife, assisted by 
the neighbor women, prepared bounteous dinners and sup- 
pers for the reapers. Lunch, consisting of pie and coffee, 
was served at 10 a. m. and 4 p. m. The hay harvest fol- 
lowed hard after the wheat, when the cradlers took up the 
scythes and the binders the pitchforks. The wheat and hay 
were put into stacks and then the harvest season was over. 
Sometimes a big harvest home barbecue or picnic followed. 

A period of inactivity followed harvest, during which 
the farmer watched his corn crop ripen, hunted squirrels, 
fished, built a house or barn, broke ground for wheat or 



428 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

attended shooting matches or camp meetings. It was dur- 
ing this period, also, that sickness prevailed, especially 
fevers and chills. 

With the appearance of frost, the corn gathering time 
was on. Much of the corn was cut in fodder, and after the 
fodder was cured the corn was shucked off. The remainder 
was gathered off the stalk, the ears being snapped off and 
hauled to the barn. During the long winter nights the 
neighbors again gathered together, this time for a husking 
bee or "corn shucking." The above was the usual program 
of the year's work. Produce for down river trade was 
gathered in the fall and loaded on boats in March or April, 
the boatmen returning by June. One cannot help but notice 
the mutual helpfulness of the pioneers of each neigh- 
borhood. 

§ 80 The First Public Utilities 

Each farm was largely self-sustaining. Each neigh- 
borhood had a small store where powder, lead, salt, iron, 
leather, whiskey and a few other commodities were bar- 
tered for beeswax, tallow, ginseng, furs, deerskins and other 
marketable produce. At the county seat stores, one could 
buy calicoes, silks, cambrics, blue cloth for men's suits, 
collars, stocks, coffee, tea, sugar and plug tobacco. The 
latter articles were costly. Money was very scarce and 
little of it passed over the counter. Trading horses was 
almost a passion with the pioneers. Two horsemen rarely 
met without a banter for a trade. Saturday afternoons at 
the taverns or towns were devoted to horsetrading, or 
"horse-swapping," as it was called. 

The most inconvenient work of the pioneer was getting 
his corn and wheat ground into meal and flour. Horse mills 
were the earliest. Such a mill consisted of a pair of burrs 
made of hard stone so set that one stone revolved on the 
other, their rough surfaces almost touching. The grind- 
ing was slow and the meal poor. Next came the water 
mills. These were often built by settlers from the east. An 
undershot waterwheel usually furnished motor power. 
They did better and quicker work than the horse mills, but 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 429 

it was often forty miles to the nearest one, and then one 
had frequently to wait two days to get his "turn." In later 
years the miller kept a large stock of flour or meal on hand, 
and could trade with the farmer at once. The most common 
evidence of pioneer life existing today in Indiana is these 
old mills with their races and dams. 

Travel through the country was tedious. The roads 
were mere bridle paths. The coach roads were continuous 
mud holes. In course of time the mud was replaced with 
poles to make the corduroy ; the poles with boards to make 
the plank roads; the boards with stone to make the pike. 
Neither has proved satisfactory. 

Along the larger roads certain houses with accommoda- 
tions for travelers came to be known as taverns. Such 
were usually the double log houses. The law compelled the 
tavern keeper to have at least one extra bed and an extra 
horse stall. The county board fixed prices for meals, lodging, 
drinks and horse feed. Each tavern paid a license fee. All 
classes of travelers ate and slept together, the sleeping usu- 
ally being done on the floor. What was lacking in style, 
however, was usually made up in geniality. One could ap- 
preciate the latter when he "alighted" at a tavern after a 
hard day's ride in the rain or snow and mud. The traveler 
was welcomed into the "big house" and given a seat before 
the roaring fire. A boy removed his muddy boots and leg- 
gings, giving the guest a light pair of slippers in return. 
Dry clothing was furnished, after which there were a 
steaming supper and a warm feather bed. Next morning 
his boots, dry and greased, his leggings and greatcoat, all 
dry and warm, were brought, he stepped dryshod from the 
door of the hostelry in the saddle stirrup and pursued his 
journey, thankful for the good night's rest and enter- 
tainment. 

§ 81 Festivals and Festivities 

The chief fixed holidays of the pioneers were New Year, 
Fourth of July and Christmas. These days were, in gen- 
eral, set aside for the little folks. In the larger towns on 



430 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the Fourth there was usually some formal banquet with 
endless toasts by the dullest of orators. On New Year's 
day there was frequently a neighborhood hunt, ending with 
something to drink. Little work was done, but no great 
amount of celebrating was ever indulged in. Christmas 
was the supreme holiday of the children. In a humbler 
way it was much as it is now. Apples, sweet-cake, home- 
made candy, such simple toys as could easily be contrived, 
together with warm gloves or stockings, knit by the mother, 
were the common gifts. The poor were remembered with 
substantial gifts of things to eat and wear. The young 
folks often arranged for a sleighride if there was snow. 
Except among the Quakers, Santa Claus was a universal 
visitor Christmas eve. The Christmas dinner was the prin- 
cipal attraction for the married folks. 

The greatest sports for the men were the shooting 
matches, which were in order from September 1 till Christ- 
mas. The long squirrel rifle, with flint lock and "set trig- 
gers," was a favorite with every pioneer and shared with 
the dog the pioneer's affections. Resting on a pair of deer 
antlers, it held the place of honor over the cabin door. Up 
to a distance of 100 yards it was fairly reliable, up to fifty 
it was accurate. 

The shooting match, like the old English contests with 
the bow and arrow, was primarily a trial of skill. Little 
value was placed on the quarters of beeves or venison won, 
as compared with the glory of winning. An elaborate sys- 
tem of rules and regulations governed it, but the essentials 
were as follows : A level stretch of ground 100 yards long, 
a large tree to receive the balls as they passed through the 
boards, charred so that the balls would make a neat round 
hole. Those who fired "offhand" stood eighty yards away, 
those with a "rest" one hundred yards. Old marksmen 
fired "offhand." There were two ways of determining the 
result. In one case the nearest shot took first choice, the 
next took second, and so on. In the other the added dis- 
tance of three shots was taken. Under some rules all three 
shots had to be within a certain distance, say two inches, 
of the center or the man lost. 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 431 

A form of amusement that came from the South, but 
which was soon abandoned in Indiana on account of its 
rudeness, was "goose pulling." A goose was hung head 
downward from the limb of a tree about ten feet high. The 
goose's neck was coated with grease. The participants rode 
under at a gallop and endeavored to pull the fowl's head off. 
Some one stood by with a whip to see that the horse passed 
at the proper gait. 

Dancing was generally indulged in before the religious 
revivals of the late twenties and early thirties. The folks 
usually gathered at some house that had an especially 
smooth puncheon floor and danced the night away. The 
sleepy old fiddler's arm was made of iron and he could reel 
off "The Arkansas Traveler," "Old Dan Tucker," or "Cot- 
ton Eye Jo," for hour after hour. The dancing consisted of 
the square dance, three figures to the set, with a Virginia 
Reel, a "jig" or a "hoe down" when some ecstatic couple 
wished to show their artistic execution of the "side step," 
"back step," "single or double shuffle," "heel and toe" or 
other fancy foot maneuvers. This harmless amusement 
may still be seen in many parts of Indiana. In many places 
it disappeared long ago before the relentless crusade of the 
Protestant churches, largely because rowdies made the 
dance the scene of drunken brawls. 

Those who had moral objections to dancing substituted 
social games which in nature much resembled the dancing. 
"Keeping Post Office," "Picking Cherries," "Weevilly 
Wheat," "London Town," "Dusty Miller," "Needle's Eye," 
were the names of some of the commoner of these. The 
players sang the refrains, accompanying them by rhythmic 
performances almost like those of the dance. Many of the 
games had forfeit features in which kisses were the inva- 
riable penalties. The intermissions at spelling schools, 
singing schools, and debates were occupied by these games. 

Weddings were the occasions for a two days' festival, 
the night intervening being devoted to dancing. The wed- 
ding was performed at the home of the bride. A formal 
invitation was sometimes written by the schoolmaster and 



432 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

carried around by the groomsman, but the usual way was 
just to "send word." The guests were supposed to arrive 
about 11 a. m. The groom, accompanied by five or six of 
his best friends, left his father's home on horseback in time 
to reach his destination about 11 :30 a. m. As soon as the 
ceremony was performed, the married couple sat down at 
the head of the table, around which all the guests gathered. 
Of all the neighborhood feasts this was the most sumptu- 
ous. Everything available in the way of rations and table 
service in the whole community was brought into service. 
After a night of dancing interspersed with all kinds of jests 
and pranks, including a charivari, at the expense of the 
married pair, the whole company repaired to the home of 
the groom's father, where another dinner, the "infare," 
was served. In the afternoon the newly married couple 
were escorted to their new home, if one were ready. If 
there was no house ready the couple lived with the old folks 
until a house was built, when the young people gathered 
together for the last ceremony of the wedding, that of in- 
ducting the couple into their new home. This, and the 
dancing which accompanied it, were called the "house warm- 
ing."4 

§ 82 Sickness and Physicians 

Contrary to most statements in novels, the health of 
the pioneers was bad. Poisonous vapors hung over the 
swamps and drowned woodlands. The sun was unable to 
penetrate the deep foliage and dispel the miasma. The river 
bottoms and flat lands were notoriously subject to malaria. 
No one thought of the housefly or mosquito being disease 
disseminators. There was no science of medicine, only a 
practice. We know now that most of their diagnoses were 
wrong, hence it is difficult to say what diseases were most 

4 Besides tbe above there were muster day, election day. and the 
camp meeting which have been described elsewhere. Discussions of 
early customs in Indiana are too numerous to mention. The following, 
however, are excellent: Baynard Hall, The New Purchase; D. D. Banta, 
MaTcing a Neighhothood; Young, History of Wayne County; William 
F. Vogel, "Home Life in Early Indiana" in Indiana Magazine of His- 
tory, X; the various county histories. 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 433 

destructive. There can, however, be no question of the 
terrible ravages of smallpox, typhoid and malarial fevers, 
pneumonia, tuberculosis and bronchitis. Among the chil- 
dren two diseases were especially prevalent at this time — 
croup and cholera infantum. The fact that at least half 
of the babies died before they reached the age of four will 
help one understand the terror caused by these ailments, 
croup in winter and cholera infantum in summer. 

Here is a recipe for cholera infantum copied from the 
Medical Investigator, published by Horace N. T. Benedict, 
a botanic physician of Springfield, Lawrence county, Indi- 
ana, in 1847 : "Take a double handful of dewberry roots, 
double handful of the roots of cranebill, two gallons of 
witch hazel leaves. Boil these separately until the strength 
is all extracted. Strain and pour the liquid into one vessel 
and boil down to a quart. Add a pint of good French 
brandy and a pound of loaf sugar." 

Or, take the following recipe for "yaller janders" (yel- 
low jaundice) : "A double handful of the bark of wild 
cherry root, an equal amount of bark from the root of the 
yellow poplar, a like quantity of sarsaparilla, same of red 
sumach roots, and half that amount of bitter root. Boil 
them in two gallons of water until it is reduced to one-half 
gallon. Strain and let it simmer down to one pint. Mix 
this with a gallon of hard cider, shake it well and add two 
ounces of madder. Take a half teacupful three times per 
day." These and others at hand illustrate the practice of 
the herb doctors or "botanic physicians," as they called 
themselves. They have only recently disappeared. The 
concoctions were intentionally made as bitter and nauseous 
as possible. In most cases the medicine was called 
"bitters." 

There were a few physicians in the State who had been 
trained in the east, but the greater number were strictly 
home-grown. As a result, this period was the heydey of 
the quack, who either came from the east or operated from 
some eastern city. The treatment of the best physicians of 
that time seems rather bloodthirsty to us. Taken as a class. 



434 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

however, they were honest, trying to the best of their abil- 
ity to serve their fellow sufferers. 

The herb doctors, or the "Botanic School," led a spirited 
fight against the other school of practitioners, whom they 
called the "calomel doctors." The calomel doctors won out 
in the long struggle, and the reputation for quackery has 
fastened itself on the "yarb" doctor just as it has on the 
"wildcat" bank and the "Deestrick skule." 

The "Thompsonians" were a school of physicians who 
took a somewhat middle ground between the "calomel" and 
the "botanic" schools. They relied very largely on vapor 
treatment. Diseases should be sweated out of the system 
was their theory. A special chair was manufactured 
known as the "vapor bath chair" and sold widely through- 
out the State. Whatever the disease might be, the patient 
was clapped into the "vapor chair" and steamed as nearly 
to death as was thought safe. This treatment was supple- 
mented usually by liberal doses of "white walnut" pills. 
The vapor treatment was perhaps the least harmful of all 
the panaceas then in vogue. 

The people were an easy prey to all kinds of knavery; 
sure cures for cancer, consumption and other prevalent dis- 
eases, especially "milk sickness," made their regular ap- 
pearance. An example, taken from an advertisement in a 
leading paper, will suffice : Fontain & Son, chemists of the 
Royal University of Paris, after long experiment, had at 
last found a certain cure for the dread disease, consump- 
tion. They named their discovery the "Restoration Fran- 
caise." The son, Louis, at once came to America and 
opened an office at Washington, D. C. By way of adver- 
tisement he offered through all the churches of Indiana to 
give an eight-franc bottle to any poor person who would 
leave his name and address with the preacher. 

Lobelia was a standard nostrum with the "botanies," 
so much so that they were frequently called in derision the 
"lobelia doctors." The standard lobelia prescription was as 
follows: "Fill a jar with the green herb, lobelia, well 
bruised and pressed, and for every quart the jar will con- 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 435 

tain add four or five pods of red pepper. Then pour on 
enough good whisky to cover the herb and let stand. The 
longer it stands the better." This was called a sovereign 
remedy for phthisic, croup, whooping cough, colds and 
catarrh. The doctor quoted, says he had administered it 
with excellent effects to infants not a day old and to the 
aged long past three score and ten. Another kindly doctor 
adds that no careful man will be without a jar of good lo- 
belia in the house, which, together with a judicious use of 
warming teas, "such as pennyroyal, catnip, balm, sage, etc., 
will save many dollars in doctors' fees, as well as many 
children's lives." 

The foregoing are sufficient to show the struggle that 
was going on in our State during this period. We are at 
first disposed, as Eggleston unfortunately did in another 
field, to hold the whole society up to ridicule. Nothing 
would be more unfair or dishonorable. These men were as 
a rule as honest as physicians are today. The superior 
skill of our physicians now is due in no small degree to the 
patient work of the pioneers.^ 

§ 83 State Charities 

Organized charity or philanthropy was unknown among 
the earliest settlers. If a man's house burned or he met 
disaster in any way, his immediate neighbors helped him 
to the best of their ability. Neighborly kindness was more 
in evidence then than now. Neighbors sat up with and 
nursed the sick and buried the dead. There were no pro- 
fessional nurses nor undertakers. The deaf and dumb, the 
blind, the lame, the insane, and the feeble minded were a 
burden to themselves and their friends. The township 
trustee gave out a little aid reluctantly to some of the un- 
fortunates. Just preceding the Civil War the counties be- 
gan to establish poor asylums where the worthy poor were 
given a home, but this has proven anything but satisfac- 
tory. 

5 Dr. G. W. H. Kemper, A Medical History of Indiana. 



436 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The hard times following the panic of 1837 caused a 
great amount of suffering. As early as 1839 the attention 
of the General Assembly was called to the miserable con- 
dition of the insane, then kept as criminals in the county 
jails. The State was not in a financial condition to under- 
take any systematic relief. The most that could be done 
was to awaken the public conscience. Expert physicians 
from the east lectured at different points in the State, and 
especially before the General Assembly, on the treatment 
and care of the insane. Governor James Whitcomb, a New 
Englander by birth and a graduate of the State University, 
took a deep interest in such matters. Among other things 
he collected reports from the county sheriffs on the num- 
bers and condition of the insane in 1842. The General As- 
sembly of that year authorized the governor to gather data 
from other States on the manner in which they cared for 
their insane. As a result of this the General Assembly in 
1844 levied a small tax for the purpose and the next year 
a commission drew up plans and arranged for the purchase 
of the farm of Nathaniel Bolton, on Mount Jackson, imme- 
diately west of Indianapolis. In 1847 the central building 
was erected on this site at a cost of $75,000. Since then 
the State has cared in an adequate manner for such un- 
fortunates. 

In 1843 William Willard, a mute from the east, visited 
Indiana and estalished a school for his fellow defectives. 
The work was looked upon with favor, and in 1844 the State 
opened a school with Mr. Willard in charge. Such men as 
Henry Ward Beecher and Bishop Matthew Simpson took 
an active interest in the work. A site for a school, 130 
acres, just east of Indianapolis, was purchased in 1846, 
where, by 1850, a spacious building was erected. The school 
has been entirely successful and still flourishes. 

The founder of the blind asylum of Indiana was William 
H. Churchman, himself blind. He was bom in Baltimore 
and educated in Pennsylvania. He began teaching in 1839. 
James M. Ray, of Indianapolis, visited his school in Louis- 
ville and at once became interested in the work. A small 



PIONEERS AND THEIR SOCIAL LIFE 437 

appropriation in 1845-6 enabled Mr. Ray and Mr. Church- 
man to visit different parts of the State and awaken an 
interest in the condition of the blind. The ministers, as 
usual, assisted in the charitable work, Mr. Beecher taking 
the lead. The friends of the unfortunate blind were at 
first reluctant to let them go from their immediate care. 
Finally, Mr. Churchman and his friends found twenty blind 
persons who would attend, and twenty-eight more who 
were eligible and friendly to the undertaking. With these 
the asylum was opened in Indianapolis in 1847. The school 
grew slowly but surely and during the next ten years 
earned for itself a place in the public confidence.^ 

6 George "W. Cottman in Indiana Magazine of History, March, 1914. 
Goodrich and Tuttle, History of Indiana, ch. 34. The newspapers of 
the decade from 1840 to 1S50 contain the popular discussions of this 
question. The public interest which from 1827 to 1840 had been ab- 
sorbed in internal improvements was turned to schools and benevolent 
institutions. 



(29) 



CHAPTER XIX 
the mexican war 

§ 84 Texas and Oregon Questions 

As early as 1820 young men of Indiana became inter- 
ested in Texas. The extraordinary offers of land by Moses 
Austin and others who had received large land grants from 
the young Mexican Republic attracted these adventurers. 
Visiting New Orleans in the flatboat trade, they heard with 
astonishment the stories of border life. The decade from 
1840 to 1850 in Indiana offered little inducement to the ad- 
venture-loving sons of the old Indian fighters. The Texas 
country, covered with herds of buffalo, and almost sur- 
rounded by warlike Indians and Mexicans, and inhabited by 
such renowned heroes as Bowie, Houston, Crockett, and 
Travis, had for them a resistless fascination. After a 
month's trip on a flatboat, finding themselves at New Or- 
leans in the opening of the spring, with more money in 
their pockets than they had ever had before, with romantic 
Texas, easily reached on the one hand, and far-away, pro- 
saic Indiana, reached by a tedious upstream trip in a row- 
boat, or a walk of 1,500 miles, on the other hand, it is not 
hard to understand how many of the young flatboatmen in 
the early days drifted into Texas. 

Many of them, after a stay of a few years, returned to 
tell the folks at home of the wonderful country. Their let- 
ters, as well as the accounts of the heroic war of liberation 
in Texas, and the fight of the warriors at the Alamo, were 
printed in the Indiana "papers and eagerly read. 

Keeping these conditions in mind, one can appreciate 
the dismay with which the Whigs learned that the Demo- 



THE MEXICAN WAR 439 

cratic National Convention in 1844 had discarded Van Bu- 
ren, who opposed the annexation of Texas, and had nomi- 
nated Polk, who favored it.^ "What a result!" said one of 
the leading Whigs when he heard what the convention had 
done. "It has nominated a man of no distinction, a South- 
erner, a slaveholder, an anti-tariff man, a sub-treasuryite, 
and a Texas annexationist." ^ 

His attitude on Texas, together with the fact that Polk 
favored the annexation of Oregon, whither many Indian- 
ians had gone in the last ten years, insured his carrying 
Indiana.^ Could the voters of Indiana be expected to sup- 
port a man who would disown and cast off hundreds of their 
friends and relatives who had gone to Texas and Oregon? 
Not even the great personal popularity of Clay could induce 
them to do it. 

§ 85 Indiana Militia in 1846 

In territorial times, and for many years after Indiana 
became a State, the militia were kept in good condition. 
Every man took his place in the organization. The leading 
men of the State were proud to be colonels and generals of 
militia. On training day the companies vied with each 
other in the expertness of their drill, in the attractiveness 
of their uniforms, and the condition of their arms. 

As the terrors of the War of 1812 were forgotten, and 
the Indians, year by year, disappeared from the State, the 
interest in military affairs decreased. In the Black Hawk 
War, 1832, the State was able to call out some fairly good 
companies of soldiers. But as there proved no need for 
them, no permanent interest was aroused. In fact, Major 
Beckes' company bcame mutinous and Colonel Russell's 
battalion was made so much sport of by the newspapers 
that the militia lost rather than gained prestige. By 1840 
the "cornstalk" militia had become a joke.^ The law, never- 

1 Indiana Journal, June 29, and July 6. 1844. 

2 Indiana Journal, June 8, 1844. 

3 Indiana Journal, Nov. 23, 1839. 

4 Laws of Indiana, 1843, cb. VII. The militia law of 1831. This 
latter was printed separately and is very rare. 



440 . HISTORY OF INDIANA 

theless, remained on the statute books. '^ The militia offi- 
cers had become purelj^ nominal, without duties. Neither 
did the State have any arsenal nor munitions of war of any 
kind. At the beginning of the year 1846 the State had a 
few hundred old muskets, yagers, pistols, carbines, and per- 
haps 500 Hall's Rifles. Even these were scattered over the 
State, stored away in barns and other similar places. The 
State also possessed one six-pound cannon. The law per- 
mitted organized companies to draw these old arms and 
use them for training purposes. Many of them were very 
properly thrown away by the militiamen as soon as they 
were received.^ An adjutant-general was still among the 
State officers and drew a salary of $100 per year. 

David Reynolds, who held the position of adjutant-gen- 
eral when the Mexican War began, was a man of energy 
and judgment, though entirely ignorant of all military af- 
fairs. His tireless activity made up in a large measure for 
this deficiency of military knowledge and the lack of prep- 
aration by the State. The General Assembly of 1847 re- 
warded his efforts by raising his salary to $250. 

The last report of the State militia to the ordnance of- 
fice of the United States had been made in 1832. There 
were in 1846 a few companies of organized militia, but the 
State had no record of them. There were, it seems, two 
colonels, but not a general of either brigade or division, the 
only officers whose duty it was to report to the State Adju- 
tant-General.'^ 

Since 1836 there had been a constantly growing inter- 
est among Indianians for Texas affairs. It was heightened 
by the Texas Declaration of Independence, the recognition 

5 They were called the "Cornstalk" militia because they frequently 
used cornstalks instead of guns on training day and because the only 
distinctive part of their uniforms were the corntassels in their caps. 

6 Report of the Quartermaster, Samuel Beck, Nov. 30, 1845. Docu- 
mentary Journal, 1845-6, pt. II, 45. 

7 The adjutant general reported that while it was true the system had 
undergone a general paralysis the martial spirit of the people was not 
extinguished. A number of energetic independent companies and a few 
regiments of district militia had survived the general disorganization. 
Report of Adjutant General Reynolds, Nov. 29, 1845. Documentary 
Journal, 1845-46, pt. II, 37. 



THE MEXICAN WAR 441 

by President Jackson, March 3, 1837,^ by the various pro- 
posals for annexation, by the annexation itself in 1845, and 
by the dispatch of General Zachary Taylor with an army 
of occupation to the disputed country.^ As he crept slowly 
toward the Rio Grande with his army the conviction deep- 
ened that war would result. Finally, May 13, 1846, came 
the declaration of war,io the news reaching Indianapolis 
May 21, in time for the papers of May 23. ^^ 

§ 86 Organizing the Indiana Brigade 

May 16, three days after the declaration, the United 
States secretary of war, by letter, required of the governor 
of Indiana three regiments of Volunteers. The governor 
received the requisition during the evening of May 21 and 
issued his proclamation the next day.^- Along with the 
proclamation was sent a memorandum of the directions of 
Congress, enacted May 13, for arming and equipping the 
militia. 

Each regiment was to consist of a colonel, lieutenant- 
colonel, a major, and an adjutant who was also a lieutenant 
of one of the companies. These were called the field offi- 
cers. There were, besides, a sergeant-major, quartermas- 
ter-sergeant, and two musicians. Each regiment was com- 
posed of ten companies, each containing one captain, one 
first lieutenant, one second lieutenant, four sergeants, four 
corporals, two musicians, and eighty privates. A full regi- 
ment thus consisted of 937 men, or a total of 2,811 men to 
be raised in the State. 

The governor designated Camp Clark, just east of New 
Albany, as the meeting place or rendezvous of the little 

8 Messages and Papers of the President, III, 281. 

9 Lew Wallace, An AutoMography, I, 102 seg. "I wanted the war, 
thinking of little else, and I went about hunting news and debating 
the probabilities. I haunted the Journal office. My pockets were full 

• of newspapers, especially those of New Orleans and New York." 

10 Laws of United States, 1846, ch. XVI. 

11 Indiana Democrat, May 23, 1846. See also Governor's Proclama- 
tion, May 22, 1846. 

12 Documentary Journal, 1846, pt. II, 8. 



442 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

army. The proclamation gave any citizen of the State the 
privilege of organizing a company. 

A wave of military enthusiasm passed over the State 
with the news of war. Mass meetings were held in the 
larger towns, where popular speakers inflamed the younger 
men with stories of the heroism of war. The declaration 
of war was read and approved almost everywhere. At 
Indianapolis it was solemnly resolved, on motion of the cir- 
cuit judge, "that the war ought to be carried into the 
enemy's country and the Star Spangled Banner planted in 
the city of Mexico on the halls of the Montezumas.''^^ 

Lew Wallace, then a young man of nineteen years, 
opened a recruiting office at Indianapolis, enrolled a com- 
pany, and had it organized in three days. The nearest rail- 
road, in fact, the only railroad in the State, ran from 
Edinburg to Madison. Patriotic farmers hauled the volun- 
teers in their wagons to Edinburg, whence they proceeded 
by rail, or, more properly, by tramway, to Madison and 
thence down to Camp Clark by boat.^^ 

The response was similar from all parts of the State. 
Captains William Ford and Thomas L. Sullivan had two 
companies ready in a short time at Madison. Capt. William 
Walker of Evansville at once tendered the services of the 
"Indiana Riflemen," a volunteer company of which he was 
captain. Two companies came from Fort Wayne by way 
of the Ohio canals and the Ohio river. Capt. Spier S. Tip- 
ton's company from Logansport passed Indianapolis June 
12; Capt. H. S. Lane's company from Crawfordsville 
reached Indianapolis June 13, on its way to New Albany. 
By June 10, the State requisition was filled and the thirty 
companies accepted; by June 20, all had arrived at New 
Albany and were ready to embark for New Orleans. 

At Camp Clark the volunteers began to experience some 
of the realities of war. The weather was hot and the camp 
equipment poor. There was a great deal of politics and 
consequently a great deal of dissatisfaction in the election 
of officers. The governor and lieutenant governor were on 

13 Lew Wallace, An AutoMographp, I, 115. 

14 Madison Banner, May 27, 30, 1&46. 



THE MEXICAN WAR 443 

the grounds, and the Whigs charged that they were there to 
see that their political favorites were properly cared for.^^ 

The State treasury had been empty for eight years pre- 
vious to the outbreak of the war. At no time in its history 
have the State's finances been in a worse condition than in 
1846. The governor at once appealed to the branches of 
the State bank. Most of the branches responded at once. 
Madison, Indianapolis, Lawrenceburg, New Albany, Evans- 
ville, Fort Wayne and Lafayette placed from $5,000 to 
$10,000 each at the governor's disposal. The South Bend, 
Michigan City, Vincennes and Terre Haute branches were 
either unable or unwilling to aid. 

With the assistance of these loans the State was able 
to place its quota in the field in nineteen days. Besides 
the thirty companies received, twenty others had applied 
to the governor for service before June 17. ^'^ 

The volunteers spent about two weeks at Camp Clark.^'^ 
They were mustered into the United States service June 
19. IS General John E. Wool, Governor Whitcomb and Lieu- 
tenant Governor Paris Dunning reviewed the troops on the 
20th. Tents were drawn, one for each six men, rations 
distributed, and the Indiana Brigade went into regular 
camp. At first there was some objection to drinking the 
warm river water, but no serious sickness resulted. 

On July 3, Col. James P. Drake announced that the 
First Regiment would embark on the 5th. After firing a 
few rounds with cannon, the soldiers settled down to hard 
work on the Fourth of July and by sunrise of the 5th they 

15 Lew Wallace, An AutoMography, I, 116. It was also charged that 
the president handed out commissions in the army in i-eturn for votes 
against the Wilmot Proviso. Indiana Journal, April 2. 1847. The In- 
diana Journal, June 7, 1847, said the election of Colonel William A. 
Bowles for the responsible position of colonel was directly due to the 
intrigues of Governor Whitcomb. The Wabash Express referred to 
Dunning as the "big dog" around the encampment. State Journal, 
July 15. For a commentary on the miserable, petty, polities employed 
in organizing the troops, see Dunning's letter in his own defense, Jour- 
nal, Nov. 20, 1846. See also Thomas O'Neal's letter in the Journal, Dec. 
15, 1846. 

16 Indiana Sentinel, June 17, 1846. 

17 This was frequently called Camp Whitcomb. 

18 Indiana Sentinel, June 27, 1846. 



444 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

were marching aboard the steamboats "Grace Darling" and 
"Cincinnati." 

The First Regiment reached New Orleans July 11. The 
six days' journey down the river had given the troops an 
impression that war was about the most pleasant occupa- 
tion possible. They received their first shock, however, 
when they went into camp in the thin mud on the river 
bank below New Orleans. Their visions of glory began to 
fade. Several men had died on the trip down. A consid- 
erable number were sick. There was no dry ground on 
which to stretch their tents. Having no straw nor brush, 
they spread their new blankets on the wet ground. Soon 
the muddy slime had worked its way through the thin blan- 
kets. The camp took on the appearance of a hog-wallow. 
The weather was hot, but the air was too moist to dry the 
muddy blankets. 

Four days were spent by the Hoosier volunteers on the 
glorious slime-covered battlefield of New Orleans, before 
ships could be secured to carry them across the gulf. They 
then embarked on two small vessels.^'' On the gulf other 
new experiences awaited the volunteers. They had cleaned 
up their blankets and new regimentals as soon as the gulf 
breeze had dried the mud into harmless sand. But seasick- 
ness struck them with worse damage to their new clothes 
than had been done by the New Orleans mud. A volunteer 
from Hendricks county died and was buried at sea. The 
melancholy sight made a deep impression on the men. One 
of the transport ships was out eleven days on the trip, hav- 
ing been driven out by a storm; others crossed in three 
days.-^ 

19 The soldiers commented on the enormous size of these ships; one, 
the "Flavio," was of 640 tons burden, the other of 350 tons. 

20 The following from a letter printed in the BrookviUe American, 
Aug. 21, 1846: 

"Imagine two hundred men stowed away in a small brig with a four 
and one-half foot hold. All of her crew with two hundred volunteers to 
sleep in that hold ; warm nights and sometimes a heavy sea ; the hatches 
all down, without a window or an air hole; to live on coffee, slop fed 
food, meat and dry crackers; half the men seasick and spewing all about 
you ; sometimes you would find yourself eating and some one close by 



THE MEXICAN WAR 445 

§ 87 Campaigning in Mexico 

The Indiana Brigade landed at Brazos, thirty miles 
from Matamoras. They were disappointed at finding noth- 
ing but a barren, sandy coast where they had ex- 
pected a large city. A hunter's hut was the only sign of 
human habitation. Two ships were wrecked on the sandy 
coast, but no lives were lost. Measles and dysentery, due 
to bad drinking water, broke out in the camp at the mouth 
of the Rio Grande. Colonel Drake reported that one hun- 
dred of his command were sick, August S.^i Thirteen had 
died by September 1. 

The First Regiment was left indefinitely to guard imag- 
inary supplies at this camp at the mouth of the Rio Grande. 
The other two regiments camped sixteen miles farther up 
the river. 

Colonel Drake visited General Taylor and asked permis- 
sion to remove the First Regiment from the unhealthful 
camp, but the request was refused. Here, then, they re- 
mained until December 10, when all three Indiana regi- 
ments started up the river to join the main army. After 
a short march the First Regiment, to its great disgust, was 
again ordered back to the mouth of the Rio Grande. The 
Second and Third Regiments continued their march, reach- 
ing Monterey shortly after Christmas, and Saltillo January 
1, 1847. 

General Taylor had gradually crowded the Mexicans 
south past Monterey to Saltillo. The Mexicans under Santa 
Anna gathered head again at San Luis Potosi, 200 miles 
to the south. At this time General Scott took active com- 
mand of the troops of the United States, and ordered Tay- 
lor to send him most of his seasoned soldiers to aid in a 
march on Mexico from Vera Cruz. 

The departure of the regular troops compelled Taylor 
to gather his little remaining army closer together. The 
Indiana regiments were ordered up to join the other troops 

would let slip right on your dinner and your clothes; and then you will 
imagine how pleasant our trip was from New Orleans to this place." 
21 Indiana Democrat, Aug. 11, 1846. 



446 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

at the front at Saltillo. A scouting party of eighty Ken- 
tucky cavalry was surrounded and, on the night of January 
21, captured at El Salado, ninety miles south of Saltillo.-^ 
A captain escaped and returned with the news that Santa 
Anna with an overwhelming army was rapidly advancing 
on Saltillo. Taylor at once decided to take a position in a 
mountain pass five miles south of Buena Vista, through 
which the road to San Luis Potosi passed. 

Here on the afternoon of February 22, the little Ameri- 
can army of 5,000 men was confronted by Santa Anna with 
an army of 20,000 men. General Wool arranged the line 
of battle. The seasoned troops were stationed in the pass, 
expecting a direct frontal attack, while the Illinois, Indiana 
and Kentucky volunteers were stationed far out on the left 
flank to prevent the Mexicans coming around that wing, 
the Second Indiana occupying the extreme left. 

The Americans took up their position about the middle 
of the afternoon of February 22, 1847. A short time be- 
fore this, clouds of dust had been seen rising in the south. 
An hour later the advance guard of the Mexican army ap- 
peared before the fortifications on the main road and de- 
manded that the Americans surrender. After a show of 
fight there, a brigade of Mexican light troops marched up 
the ravine and attacked the Indiana and Illinois volunteers. 
The fighting continued till dark at that point without ad- 
vantage. 

The tired troops slept, or tried to sleep, where 
they had fought. Some of them have related how they 
sat up and watched the fitful flashes of the senti- 
nels' guns as they kept up a spattering fire through 
the night. One of them was reminded of the fireflies 
hovering over the meadows at home on a summer 
night.23 At daybreak the soldiers were ordered into line 
just as a Mexican band began to play their national air. 
A battery of five eight-pounders had taken position on the 
left of the Indianians, and, as they were moving forward 
to support this, two Mexican divisions, 7,000 strong, 

^2 Indiana Sentinel, March 17. 1847. 

23 James A. Cravens. Lew Wallace. An Autobiography, I, 169. 



THE MEXICAN WAR 447 

marched out to the ravine in their front and formed in 
battle line 100 yards away. The Indiana regiment, only 
360 strong, was under the immediate command of its old 
colonel. Gen. Joseph Lane. As the Mexicans defiled from 
the ravine the Indianians dropped to their knees and the 
strange battle began, the Indianians outnumbered eighteen 
to one. A battery of five guns supported the Hoosiers. 
While the battle was going on. General Lane sought to 
make the American fire more effective by moving his men 
up closer. Just at this time a second column of Mexicans 
appeared on the left. Seeing these, or thinking the battle 
lost, and that it was best to save what men he could, Colonel 
Bowles, who was at the opposite end of the line from Gen- 
eral Lane, gave the order to retreat. Thus, while the left 
of the line started forward in obedience to General Lane's 
order, the right started to face back at the command of its 
colonel. 

The retreat soon became a run. Twenty of the men 
never stopped till they reached the buildings of the ranch 
at Buena Vista. General Lane, Lieutenant Colonel W. R. 
Haddon, and Colonel Bowles succeeded in reforming 190 of 
them, who, along with the Third Indiana and a Mississippi 
regiment under Col. Jefferson Davis, returned to the field 
in time to join in the final attack on the charging Mexi- 
cans. Under their own officer, Lieutenant Colonel Haddon, 
and formed on their own colors, they helped as bravely as 
any other troops to restore the lost battle. 

These details have been given in order to show exactly 
what part the Second Indiana took in this battle. General 
Taylor, in his official report, said: "The Second Indiana, 
which had fallen back, could not be rallied and took no fur- 
ther part in the action, except a handful of men, who, under 
its gallant Colonel Bowles, joined the Mississippi regiment 
and did good service." In another place General Taylor in 
his report said : "Arkansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Mississippi, 
Texas, and some Indiana men had fought hard all this 
dreadful day." As evidence of this latter his own official 
report shows that the Second Regiment lost 107 of its 360 



448 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

men; 90 of these fell in the morning, while opposing more 
than 7,000 Mexicans on the open field. The time during 
which they stood under fire is shown by the fact that they 
fired twenty rounds each. Santa Anna in his official re- 
port said his men were on the point of retreating when the 
American line broke. Had not the stupid blunder been 
made by the officers of the Second Regiment, the Mexicans 
might have been routed and the glory of the battle instead 
of its disgrace would have belonged to the Indianians. 

The fault lies deeper. The officers of the volunteers 
were all petty politicians. Indiana had competent men, 
trained for war, but through pohtical juggling not one of 
them was called into service. Of the three colonels and 
one brigadier general, not one could have led a company 
through the manual of arms. Two of them later learned 
the manual at least, but Colonel Bowles, of the unfortunate 
Second, did not. His election to the colonelcy was very 
questionable, and he had never pretended to drill his regi- 
ment. Gen. Joseph Lane and Col. James H. Lane quar- 
reled incessantly, and a duel between them was pending at 
the time of the Battle of Buena Vista. The First Regiment 
was left at the mouth of the Rio Grande and forbidden even 
to move its camp out of the swamp. Seventy of its mem- 
bers were buried there, where the wind and tide soon re- 
moved the shallow covering of sand and left their bodies 
to the birds and wild animals. From this same Camp 
Belknap 259 men were sent home sick. Many of them 
died on the way. All three of the regiments felt, with 
what seems at this date and distance good reason, that they 
had been intentionally neglected by the commander-in- 
chief. As an explanation, it may be that General Taylor 
did not care to risk his fortunes in the hands of officers 
selected as he and General Wool knew the Indiana officers 
had been. At any rate, the regiments that went away to 
war carrying flags made and presented by patriotic women, 
feasted and toasted at every opportunity, hauled in wagons 
by admiring farmers and finally praised by every expectant 
politician, returned a sickly, sorry, quarrelsome wreck with 



THE MEXICAN WAR 449 

doubtful reputation for soldierly discipline and bravery. 
The fault, however, was not with the men.-* 

The war was not over. April 24 Governor Whitcomb 
received a requisition for a fourth regiment. This was or- 
ganized at Camp Clark June 16, under Col. Willis A. Gor- 
man, and dispatched from New Albany June 27. They were 
ordered to Brazos to join General Taylor. September 3 
they were at the mouth of the Rio Grande on their way to 
Vera Cruz; September 16 they arrived at Vera Cruz. 

August 31 a requisition for a fifth regiment was re- 
ceived. This was organized at Madison and mustered into 
service October 22, under James H. Lane, formerly colonel 
of the Third. It embarked for Vera Cruz October 31.25 jt 
reached that place November 24, after experiencing a se- 
vere squall on the gulf. By the last of July, 1848, these 
troops had all returned, having acquitted themselves nobly 
in the march on Mexico. Gen. Joseph Lane won especial 
honors in this campaign. A season of barbecues followed, 
the battle flags were presented to the State amid solemn 
ceremonials, and the chapter was closed. The State had 
furnished promptly a small army of five thousand men, who 
had marched and fought creditably. 

24 For the facts in this tangled chapter of our history, see Lew Wal- 
lace, An AntoMography, I, 163, 193. The New Albany Democrat, Aug. 
24, 1848; this latter paper contains the correspondence between General 
Taylor and John Defrees and George G. Dunn; Indiana in the Mexican 
War, passim; Official reports are to be found in the Documents of the 
Mexican War; Documentary Journal of Indiana, reports of the Adjutant 
General; manuscript correspondence of George G. Dunn contains many 
letters bearing on this question. A detailed report by Lieutenant Col- 
onel W. R. Haddon is in the Western Sun, Aug., 1848. As soon as Tay- 
lor was nominated for the Presidency Indiana politicians began to 
criticise him for his report on the Second regiment. A court martial 
exonerated the soldiers from cowardice and shifted the blame to Bowles 
and Lane, but the quarrel continued. The net result of this and the 
Dunning affair was to leave a cloud on the reputation of the State and 
its soldiers. The fault was in the petty politics that put Bowles and 
Lane in such responsible positions and in 1848 used the record for par- 
tisan purposes. 

25 Documentary Journal, 1S47-8, 290-91. 



CHAPTER XX 
the constitutional convention of 1850 

§ 88 Early Agitation for Revision 

By the terms of the Constitution of 1816 it was pro- 
vided that every twelve years a referendum vote should be 
taken on the advisability or necessity of calling a constitu- 
tional convention. It was the generally accepted theory 
then, as laid down in the writings of Jefferson, that one 
generation had no moral or legal right to bind by constitu- 
tional limitation a succeeding generation. It is hardly prob- 
able that the framers of the constitution intended by this 
provision to prevent the citizens of Indiana from calling 
a constitutional convention at any time they chose. It is 
more probable that it was intended by this referendum to 
insure each generation two chances of holding a conven- 
tion in spite of an opposing General Assembly. It must be 
kept in mind that the immediate followers of Jefferson 
looked with favor upon the constitutional convention as one 
of the most effective institutions of popular democracy. ^ 

There appears to have been very little demand for a new 
convention for a long time after 1816. As one of the op- 
ponents of calling a convention said in 1847, "The people of 
Indiana are attached to their constitution. It is the work 
of their forefathers. Under it for thirty years they have 
enjoyed a degree of prosperity unsurpassed by any State in 
the Union. "- 

The cause for calling a constitutional convention among 

1 Prof. C. B. Coleman in Indiana Magazine of History, VII, 41 ; 
Jacob Piatt Dunn, lUd., VII, 100. 

2 George W. Julian, in Indiana House of Representatives, Tri-weelcly 
State Journal, Jan. 15, 1847. 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 451 

English speaking people is always found to be insistent and 
acting through considerable periods of time. The American 
people generally have not lightly called into activity such 
revolutionary bodies. There has always been some deep- 
seated dissatisfaction. There were several minor defects 
in the working of the State and local governments under 
the first constitution, but the chief ground of complaint 
was the working of the General Assembly. The State had 
been led by this body into a gigantic system of internal im- 
provements in which it had lost more than twelve million 
dollars. It became deeply involved in debt. Its bonds were 
hawked about the eastern markets as low as seventeen 
cents on the dollar. A gang of hungry office-holders had 
been and still were robbing it; and the General Assembly 
seemed unable or unwilling to shake them off. The annual 
meetings of the Assembly seemed to be an unnecessary ex- 
pense and the annual elections kept the people in a political 
turmoil. Moreover, the General Assembly was neglecting 
the affairs of the State and giving its time and attention 
to hundreds of petty private affairs. A reading of the titles 
of the special laws of any session will give one an idea of 
the petty jobbery that was carried on by means of special 
laws. 

With all this dissatisfaction the demand for a conven- 
tion, if we are to take the votes on the subject as evidence, 
was not strong. There is scarcely any mention of the vote 
on the subject up till 1846. A referendum had, however, 
been taken in 1823, only seven years after the constitution 
went into effect. ^ The vote was decisive against calling a 
convention. In 1828, four years later, the regular twelve 
year referendum was taken with a similar result.'^ During 
the following twelve years there was little agitation on the 
subject. The General Assembly of 1845, however, took up 
the subject. There was a spirited demand by a few ener- 
getic members for a convention. They succeeded in pass- 

3 Laws of Indiana, 1822, 121. Each voter was directed by this law 
to indicate on the bottom of his ballot before he handed it in. whether 
or not he favored calling a constitutional convention. 

4 Latos of Indiana, 1827, 22. 



452 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

ing a law authorizing a referendum on the subject at the 
ensuing August election.^ This was six years earher than 
the constitution demanded a referendum, but the friends 
of the movement urged with force that the people had an 
undeniable and inalienable right to call a constitutional 
convention whenever they pleased. 

The result of this referendum vote was that out of a 
total of 126,133 votes cast at the State election there were 
33,173 for a convention, and 28,843 opposed. A majority of 
all the voters had not expressed themselves on the subject.^ 

When the vote was reported to the General Assembly, 
it provoked a serious debate."^ It was generally agreed that 
the vote was not decisive ; that it did not warrant the Gen- 
eral Assembly in calling the proposed convention, but many 
members favored submitting the question again to a popu- 
lar vote at the next August election. Other members op- 
posed all agitation on the subject as calculated to bring po- 
litical disquiet and unrest. The times, it was pointed out, 
were especially dangerous. The State was almost bankrupt, 
taxes were high, and times were hard. Of all times the 
present, it was urged, would be the worst to agitate a 
change in the fundamental law.^ 

5 Laws of Indiana, 1845, 97. This convention stiould liave power to 
"alter, revise, or amend the constitution." 

6 Tri-toeekly State Journal, Jan. 15, 1847. 

7 Tri-iveekly State Journal, Jan. 13, and Jan. 15. 1847. The debate 
is given almost in full. Henry Secrest of Putnam county, John Taryan, 
Cyrus L. Dunham of Washington and George W. Julian of Wayne, were 
the principal spealiers. 

8 The committee to which it was referred in the House favored a 
convention. The debates are given in the State Journal, Jan. 13, 1847. 
The minority, all Whigs, made an unfavorable report. This was written 
by John Bowling, a Whig editor of Terre Haute. The following edi- 
torial of the Indiana State Journal, Jan. 5, 1847, sums up the opposition 
or Whig argument: "A change in the fundamental law should not be 
made for trivial causes. It ought to be made only to abrogate some 
great wrong resulting from its provisions. Frequent changes impair 
the respect in which a constitution, to be valuable, ought to be held by 
the people. We hold that when a mode of changing the constitution 
is provided by the constitution itself that any other mode is wrong. It 
must be done by that mode. Any other course is revolution itself. Our 
constitution has such a provision. The present assembly nor the past 
has any right to call a convention or submit the question to a vote. The 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 453 

In spite of the efforts of a determined group of mem- 
bers, the question was not favored by the Assembly. It 
is noticeable that what might be called the professional 
politicians avoided taking sides in this discussion. The ref- 
erendum in 1846 was not mentioned in the leading papers, 
and evidently was not discussed on the stump. The gov- 
ernor in reporting the result of the vote in his annual mes- 
sage made no recommendation that might be construed into 
a position. 

The demand for a convention, however, did not cease. 
The Democratic Party, in general, favored the proposition. 
The court practice, they said, was especially costly. Pro- 
bate courts and associate judges were popularly regarded 
as worse than useless — they were meddlesome. The jus- 
tices had once been the chief officers of the county, but 
since a board of commissioners had taken their duties, they 
had become petty politicians, valuable only to those who 
wished to bribe a court or corrupt a jury. 

Many good citizens, regardless of party, also looked 
upon the appointing power of the governor as a source of 
much evil. They thought that such officers as the auditor, 
treasurer, and other State officers should be elected by the 
people rather than by the General Assembly. The recent 
attempt by the governor to barter nominations to the su- 
preme court for a seat in the United States Senate had 
given a concrete point to the general demand to limit the 
appointing power of the governors. By 1849 Governor 
Whitcomb, sure of his promotion to the United States Sen- 
ate, came out openly for a convention in his annual mes- 
sage. He no doubt put his finger on the weakest point in 
the government under the old constitution when he em- 
phasized the evil of private and local legislation. In the 
annual volumes of laws for the previous four or five ses- 
sions the local laws had outnumbered the general five or 

vote at last August was not a warrant for a convention. It was less 
than half that polled for governor. This legislature clearly has no right 
to malie iwovision for calling a convention. There is no demand. No 
part of it is oppressive. It is better than can be made now." Then 
comes the prosperity plea. It is a fine statement of the conservative 
argument against change. 

(30) 



454 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

six to one. In the volume of 1849 there are 343 acts 
published as "Local Laws" and 273 as "General Laws," of 
the latter over 200 being strictly "local." The time of the 
whole session was consumed in political jockeying and log 
rolling.^ The annual volume of laws noted above contains 
616 laws and thirty-seven joint resolutions. i*^ 

§ 89 Organizing the Convention 

The General Assembly of 1848 took up the convention 
question and passed an act submitting the question of call- 
ing a constitutional convention to the voters. ^^ A large ma- 
jority of the votes cast at the ensuing August election were 
in favor of calling a convention. i- The following General 
Assembly by act approved January 18, 1850, ordered an 
election of delegates. The election was held at the same 
time and in all essential parts was the same as an election 

9 Prof. James A. Woodburn in Indiana Magazine of History, X, 238. 

10 One of these laws clianged the name of Belsora Barsheba Ingle- 
wright to Belsora Barsheba Thompson. Another permitted Charity Ann 
Wise to sue for divorce in Marion county, instead of in her home coun- 
ty. The following editorial stated the Whig position : "The General 
Assembly will have to prepare for the Constitutional Convention. We 
hope an early day for an election of delegates and the meeting may be 
fixed. These members ought to be elected at the April election and 
meet in June. Let the result be voted on in October. No party consid- 
eration ought to hold in selecting delegates. If the election is held in 
August it will be partisan. We voted for a Constitutional Convention 
because we wanted the following changes: Biennial sessions; election 
of judges and all other offices; a general banking law; a homestead 
exemption law, fines to go to the school funds of the township. Most 
important of all, elections by the legislature are corrupt. The course 
of Governor Whitcomb ought to settle such elections forever." 

iiLfftos of Indiana, 1S4S, 36. The first bill introduced in the House 
and the fourth in the Senate were the convention bills. The records bear 
no evidence of the discussion, if any, that was had. The votes usually 
stood about 60 to 40 in the House. The only parts of the act that seem 
to have been debated related to the number and selection of the dele- 
gates. One facetious representative, in answer to the evident tenor of 
this discussion, moved that the House appoint each member a delegate. 
They finally did the nearest possible thing to this by maliing each As- 
sembly district a delegate district. 

12 The vote stood 81,500 for and 57.418 against. The total vote cast 
for the candidates for governor were 147,232 (no report from Fayette). 
The aflirmative majority for the convention was thus about 8,000. 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 455 

of members of the General Assembly. There were 150 del- 
egates chosen from the same districts as the members of 

the House and Senate, except in two unimportant dis- 
tricts.i3 

There was little interest in the campaign as far as elect- 
ing delegates was concerned. It was hoped by many to 
make the elections non-partisan, but such was not the case 
as a rule. It seems true, however, that the Whigs, being 
in a minority, took considerably less political interest in the 
election than the Democrats. 

A caucus of the Whig members of the General Assembly 
declared in favor of a constitutional convention and espe- 
cially urged that the following changes be made in the con- 
stitution. All officers should be elected by popular vote; 
the General Assembly should be prohibited from borrow- 
ing money except for urgent necessities; the county sem- 
inary funds should be transferred to the fund for common 
schools; the General Assembly should meet biennially; lo- 
cal legislation should be prohibited; the number of offices 
should be reduced and the establishment of new ones for- 
bidden; a homestead exemption should be provided; and 
more encouragement should be given to agriculture, min- 
ing, and manufacturing. 14 

In the county of Marion the Whigs offered to divide the 
ticket equally and make no contest, but the Democrats re- 
fused.i^ In Jefferson county the Whigs compromised on a 
ticket of two Whigs and one Democrat. There were many 
other instances in which fusion tickets were elected with- 
out contest, but fusion was not general. Of the 50 dele- 
gates from senatorial districts 33 were Democrats and 17 
were Whigs ; of the 100 delegates from representative dis- 
tricts 64 were Democrats and 36 Whigs. Of the 50 State 
senators elected at the time 33 were Democrats and 17 
Whigs; of the representatives 62 were Democrats and 38 
Whigs. It will thus be seen that the political affiliations of 

13 Laws of Indiana, 1849, 29. 

14 Indiana Tri-weekly Journal, May 1, 1850. 

15 Indiana State Journal, May 1, 1850. 



456 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the members of the General Assembly and the constitu- 
tional convention were the same. 

The delegates, 150 in number, assembled in the capitol 
building, October 7, 1850, and were organized by the sec- 
retary of State, Charles H. Test.^"^ They were a repre- 
sentative body of citizens. The best known men of the 
State at the time, however, were not present. From our 
distance, one would say that Robert Dale Owen, Alvin P. 
Hovey, Thomas A. Hendricks, W. S. Holman, Schuyler Col- 
fax and Horace P. Biddle were among its most distinguished 
members, but they were young and mostly without wide 
reputation at the time. The really noted men of the con- 
vention as they gathered together for the first time, were 
Thomas D. Walpole, Abel Pepper, Daniel Kelso, James G. 
Reed, David Kilgore, Ross Smiley, Michael G. Bright, Wil- 
liam M. Dunn, George W. Carr, David Wallace, Jacob Page 
Chapman, James Rariden and John I. Morrison. Seventy- 
five of the members had served in the General Assembly, 
thirteen of whom had sat in the last session. Twenty-five 
more made this the stepping stone to later legislative serv- 
ice. Fourteen saw service in the United States Congress; 
two later became governors, while one was an ex-governor. 
There were seven well-known editors, three of whom came 
from Indianapolis. The great Whig lawyers of the State 
were noticeably absent. A widespread prejudice against 
educated men existed at the time. There were three grad- 
uates of the State University and perhaps as many more 
were graduates of other colleges. 

§ 90 Politics of the Convention 

The spirit of Jackson controlled the convention. Daniel 
Reed, a delegate of Monroe and a professor in the State Uni- 
versity, referred to Jackson as "a man of as remarkable 
sagacity as ever lived."^^ As a consequence of this Jack- 
sonian influence it was attempted to strengthen democracy 

16 Indiana Tri-wcekly Journal, Jan. 3, 1850. A list of the delegates 
with their districts and party affiliations is given in the State Journal 
Jan. 4, 1851. 

17 Debates and Proceedings of the Convention, 221. 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 457 

among the people by bringing the government nearer the 
voter. The secretary, treasurer, and auditor of State, for- 
merly appointed by the General Assembly, were made 
elective. To these were added the new office of superin- 
tendent of public instruction to be filled by popular elec- 
tion. Besides the above, the judges of the supreme and cir- 
cuit courts were made elective by the people for six-year 
terms. 1^ The prosecuting attorneys and the local jus- 
tices, all formerly appointed, were made elective, the former 
by the voters in the judicial circuits and the latter by the 
voters of the townships. In the county the voters were 
made the electors of a clerk of the circuit court, an auditor, 
recorder, treasurer, sheriff, coroner, and surveyor for each 
county. The General Assembly was given permission to 
establish other elective officers, a power which it has used 
quite liberally, if not frequently abused. Some of the offi- 
cers so elected were eligible only for one term, but the ma- 
jority were permitted to hold for two consecutive terms. 
In dealing with the suffrage elections and office-holding, 
the general principles of Jacksonian Democracy then 
prevalent were applied. In general the convention made 
the most liberal application of the principles of manhood 
suffrage and popular elections. It was accused in many 
places of playing politics by allowing unnaturalized citi- 
zens to vote after one year's residence. 

In dealing with the negroes, both free and slave, the 
convention illustrated the confused political notions of the 
times. It reenacted the provisions of the Ordinance of 
1787 with a bruskness that indicated an absolute majority 
of Abolitionists, yet the provisions refusing negroes the 
right to vote or even to settle in the State are, in spirit, 
directly contradictory to the above enactment. Not only 
these provisions, but the speeches of the members on the 
question of slavery, show the utmost diversity of opinion. 

• ISA significant provision in this connection was the section provid- 
ing that the State publish the decisions of the supreme court. Formerly 
these had been published privately by Judge Blacliford. The charge w^as 
made that he neglected his official duties in preparing the opinions for 
the press and that he made too much money off the volumes. 



458 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Not less than forty set speeches on slavery, few of them 
dealing with any question before the convention, were 
made by the members.^'^ 

In the article on the legislative department two impor- 
tant changes were made, both dictated by the overwhelming 
proof of experience. One change was the substitution of 
biennial for annual sessions of the General Assmbly. The 
other forbade the General Assembly making special or 
local laws. 

In this field the granting of divorces by the General 
Assembly had occasioned most hostile criticism. For two 
years the churches had opposed this exercise of power by 
a legislative body. A former General Assembly had in- 
vested the State courts with power to try divorce bills, but 
the Assembly could not by its own act divest itself of the 
power and the abuse continued. 

So far, heavy-footed experience guided the convention 
with a certain step. But when the subjects of education, 
benevolent institutions, corporations, and personal rights 
were reached, the members found trouble in coming to an 
agreement. In the field of education there was an effort 
made to give the convention a vision of its duty, but with- 
out success. The Constitution of 1816 is far more favor- 
able toward education than is that of 1850. The seminaries 
were destroyed and there was a strong sentiment favoring 
abolishing the State University, giving all funds to the 
public schools. 

Likewise the new constitution shows little influence of 
the awakening of the people to their duty to the unfortunate 
members of society. The newly established schools for deaf 
and dumb, blind, and insane are specifically provided for; 
but the wide application of benevolence made by the State 
at present finds no warrant in fundamental law. 

In the field of corporations, compromise was effected 

19 During the session James Rariden introduced a resolution endors- 
ing the Compromise of 1S50. This was done to break the alliance be- 
tween the Abolitionists and the Democrats in Indiana. It was a purely 
selfish political moAe and failed. It was condemned most severely by 
the State Journal, Feb. 22, 1851. 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 459 

between those on the one hand who favored a general law 
for all corporations and those who wished to reestablish 
a State bank, and those who opposed all corporate bodies. 
The article on "corporations" is a poor apology for the 
weary days of speechmaking on the kindred subjects of 
"debt," "banks," and "corporation control." 

In the field of natural rights the fight was on the home- 
stead exemption and on woman's rights. No better evi- 
dence of the bigotry and the ignorance of the times exists 
than the attacks of the self-styled churchmen on Robert 
Dale Owen, who led the fight for women's rights. His vic- 
tory is a tribute, however, to the open-mindedness and na- 
tive honesty of the members. 

Taken as a whole, it is not a great constitution. It suf- 
fers in comparison with the one it displaced. Its departures 
from that instrument in most cases are of very doubtful 
value. Its justification rests on the substitution of bi- 
ennial for annual Assemblies and abolishment of private 
and local legislation. On the other hand its critics rightly 
insist that the judiciary was weakened and a vast field 
opened for sinister partisan politics. 

§ 91 The New Constitution 

The convention adjourned Monday morning, February 
10, 1851. It had been in session eighteen weeks. No event 
in the State's history had received as much attention and 
publicity. The daily papers, and many of the larger week- 
lies, published the proceedings entire from day to day or 
from week to week. Innumerable articles by citizens in 
praise or condemnation of the work appeared in the papers. 
Answers by the members in their own defense were equally 
plentiful. Editorials explained the work of the convention 
day by day and gave the editor's opinion of its value. It 
was an eighteen weeks' course in political science for the 
citizens of the State. 

The completed constitution was read at the last session 
of the convention on the morning of February 10. It ap- 
peared at once on the front pages of the newspapers, many 



460 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

of which repeated its publication in the three or four suc- 
ceeding issues.-'^ The convention ordered 55,000 copies of 
the constitution, 50,000 in English and 5,000 in German, 
printed for distribution. These appeared early in March. ^i 

The convention had suggested that the new constitu- 
tion be submitted to the people for ratification or rejection 
at the approaching August election. The General Assem- 
bly affirmed this suggestion February 14, 1851, and the 
governor's proclamation followed immediately, directing 
the election officers to carry the order into effect.^^ 

There was no organized opposition to the ratification. 
Both parties favored the new constitution. At the ensuing 
election every county gave an affirmative majority but 
Ohio. Starke county cast a unanimous vote for the consti- 
tution. The total vote was 113,230 for, and 27,638 against 
ratification, a majority of 85,592 out of a total vote of 
140,868. The vote for the exclusion of colored persons was 
substantially the same, being an affirmative vote of 113,828 
out of a total vote of 135,701.-3 Three counties, Lagrange, 
Randolph and Steuben, voted against negro exclusion. The 
total vote on the constitution was little short of that cast 
for congressmen. The total vote in the ten congressional 
districts was 148,529. That thfere was no partisan opposi- 
tion to the constitution is shown by this vote. The Demo- 
crats carried the State by a majority of only 9,469.-^ 

The new constitution went into operation November 1, 
1851. The General Assembly elected in August, 1851, met 
as directed by the old constitution. The first general elec- 
tion under the new constitution was held in October, 1852, 
the old officers holding until the newly elected ones were 
qualified and took their positions according to law. There 
was no jar in the operations of the State government dur- 
ing the change. 

20 Indiana State Journal, Feb. 15. 1851, 

21 Indiana State Journal, ^larch 15, 1851. They were printed for the 
New Albany Ledger at the Cincinnati Gazette office. 

22 state Journal, Feb. 22, 1851. 

23 state Journal, Sept. 20, 1851. 

24 state Journal, Aug. 30, 1851. 



CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1850 461 

One of the objections urged at first against a consti- 
tutional convention was that it would cost an enormous sum 
of money at a time when the State was almost bankrupt, 
and could ill afford to spend any money except for the most 
urgent need. The total expense for the eighteen weeks' 
session as shown by the State treasurer's report was 
$85,043.82.25 

35 Documentary Journal, 1851, 8 ; 1852, 7. 



CHAPTER XXI 
POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 

§ 92 A Bankrupt State 

As soon as the political frenzy of 1840 had spent itself, 
the citizens of Indiana began to give their serious attention 
to the condition of their State government. One ugly fact 
stared them squarely in the face. That fact was that the 
State system of internal improvements was a failure. Long 
successions of mudholes marked the places where the people 
had expected to see hurrying boats bearing the produce of 
prosperous farmers to expectant buyers. For ten years the 
people had worked patiently, buoyed up by promises of ig- 
norant and dishonest politicians in the hope of seeing their 
State provided with an adequate transportation system. 

The financial condition of the State was alarming. The 
auditor reported that the total assessment valuation of the 
State had dropped from over $107,000,000 to $91,000,000. 
The income of the State from taxation had likewise dropped 
$170,901, leaving a net income for 1840 of only $192,786 
from this source. ^ The current expenses for the year were 
$136,749. There would thus be left a sum of $34,152 to 
meet the interest at six per cent on upwards of $12,000,000 
bonded debt.^ 

The outlook was gloomy enough. Turning away from 
the whole subject of internal improvement, the General 
Assembly gave its attention to governmental reorganiza- 
tion. The ways and means committee, to whom was re- 
ferred the auditor's annual statement for 1840, reported 

1 Auditor's report, in Lmcs of Indiana, 1840, 228. 

2 Treasurer's report, in Laios of Indiana, 1840, 236. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 463 

seven bills providing for a complete reorganization of the 
fiscal policy and machinery of the State. ^ 

The first was entitled a "Bill to Value the Property of 
the State."^ The law directed that the county assessor, an 
officer created by the third bill of the list, to appraise the 
real and personal property of the State at its cash value. 
On this basis the State and county governments were to 
make tax levies. County and State boards of equalization 
were provided for. The second bill, when enacted into law, 
established the offices of county and State auditors to be 
filled by popular election.^ The fourth bill defined the 
county treasurer's duties; the fifth pointed out the mode 
of making tax levies ; the sixth subjected the private stock 
in the State Bank to taxation the same as any other prop- 
erty; the seventh directed a levy of forty cents to meet 
the interest on the State debt.'^ 

This revolution in the taxing system was accomplished 
by the Whig Party. A minority of about twenty-five rep- 
resentatives opposed all the measures. In the "Address of 
the Democratic Members of the Legislature," dated Febru- 
ary 13, 1841, the measures were hotly denounced.'^ The 
prosperous condition of the State in 1834 was contrasted 
with the dismal outlook in 1840. The annual running ex- 
penses of the State in 1834 were given as $30,000 ; in 1840 
they had mounted to $840,000. There was nothing to show 
for the expenditure except a few lines of stagnant pools 
and a bitter experience. 

The Whigs assured the taxpayers that the levy of forty 
cents would pay all the State debt. The fund commission- 
ers likewise gave it as their opinion that the levy would 
soon put the State finances on a sound foundation. 

The law, which is still in substance on the statute books, 
was good, but the party that placed it on the statute book 

3 House Journal, 1840, 306. 
• 4 Laws of Indiana, 1840, ch. I. 

5 Laws of Indiana, 1840, ch. II. 

6 Laws of Indiana, 1840, chs. I to IX inclusive. 

7 Vincennes Western Sun, Mar. 6, 1841. "Ttie time has come for the 
people to take a hand. Demagogues, temporizers, gambling politicians 
must be put down. Is liberty worth such a tax?" 



464 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

was never given complete power again in the State. By- 
one of those inexplicable turns in popular government 
public opinion grasped the Whig party, internal improve- 
ments, the high tax, and the ruined State, all in a single 
thought which neither fact nor argument seemed able to 
alter. Public opinion, as is usual, was right. The Whig 
Party had had complete control of the State government 
at least since 1834. During that time taxes had increased 
eight-fold.s The party was guilty of flagrant misgovern- 
ment. Its punishment was not unmerited.-' 

The Democrats had found a vulnerable spot in the Whig 
political coat which they never failed to take advantage of. 
It made little different what the Whigs proposed or what 
argument they adduced in its support, the sufficient politi- 
cal answer was "internal improvements." During the ses- 
sion of the General Assembly of 1841-42, a series of articles 
appeared in the Indiana State Journal on the subject of the 
general responsibility for the internal improvements pol- 
icy.io The author, who was thoroughly conversant with 
the facts, made it clear that many prominent Democrats 
were supporters of the policy, but he failed to acquit his 
own party. The Whig Party, having lost its spirit, had 
become a vast host, unorganized, reposing on their arms, 
their leaders fallen or deserted. Many who had formerly 
taken a fighting interest became sullen and disgusted, 
"stung with regrets" as an editor put it, and gave no more 

8 For a clear inclictuient of the Whig Party see au address by Robert 
Dale Owen to the "Citizens of Posey county," Aug:ust, 1841; published 
in the Indkina State Sentinel, October 11. and In the Western Sun, No- 
vember 13. "Our State debt has run up in six years to one-tenth of all 
our property. Our tax is eight times as high as it was six years ago. 
Our bonds are hawked about at half i>rice like those of a bankrupt. Our 
check for interest is dishonored. All is lost, save honor, and it is for- 
feited." 

9 The following election gave the Democrats fifty-six representatives 
and the Whigs forty-four. The voters complained that they had to pay 
9 per cent, interest on their mortgages when money was worth only 6. 
The financial question was finally settled by the "Butler Bill." See 
chapter on "Internal Improvements." Indiaiia, Journal, Aug. 28, 1841; 
Western Sun, Sept. 4, 1841. 

^0 Indiana Journal, January and Februaj'y, 1842. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 465 

attention to politics.^! The whole period from 1840 to 1846 
was one of distress in Indiana. It was the long reaction 
after the debauch. The farmers pulled themselves together 
and plied their trade in dogged silence. Their pride as well 
as their prosperity was gone. 

A committee of Whig members of the General Assembly 
at the close of the session issued a long, well-written ad- 
dress, but not even the eloquence of Theodore Barnett nor 
the sound sense of John D. Defrees could make much im- 
pression. i- ''Amid the ruin and desolation which surround 
the Hoosier affairs, they have only one thing to be proud 
of, and that is their supreme bench. This is an ornament 
to American jurisprudence," remarked Pleasant Hackle- 
man, editor of the Rushville WhigJ^ 

The Democrats played a waiting game. The salaries 
of the State officials were reduced, useless offices were abol- 
ished, and the bankrupt State government relieved of every 
burden possible.^ ^ The thoughts of the people, long cen- 
tered on the activity of the State, were gradually directed 
into other channels. The schools, the churches, the benevo- 
lent institutions, agricultural societies, labor unions, num- 
berless organizations for the betterment of society, the pro- 
tection of the unfortunate and the innocent, began to re- 
ceive systematic attention and support. 

The influx of settlers and especially of workmen on the 
canal had seriously demoralized society. This was not no- 
ticed, or perhaps the vicious element did not assert itself, 

11 Indianapolis Daily Journal, Jan. 5 and 7, 1842. 

12 Indianapolis Daily Journal, Jan. 18, 1842. 

13 Indianapolis Daily Journal, June 7. 1842. 

14 "Our investigation into frauds of the system will exhibit a scene 
of villainy, fraud and corruption, scarcely, if ever, equaled in the annals 
of any country. We have appointed a special agent to close up these 
'splendid financial operations,' to sue delinquent officers and recover 
what is possible. Most have been sanctioned by law. We have also 
discharged that whole horde of blood suclj^ers, the boards of commis- 
sioners and engineers. In the actions of that most unfortunate and 
designing conclave of men, the people will discern in bold relief the 
workings of that aristocratic policy which had its paternity in Alex- 
ander Hamilton and the elder Adams," John W. Davis in "Democratic 
Address to the Voters" at close of the session of General Assembly of 
1842. Published in Western Sun March 5. 



466 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

so long as times were flush. But with the pinching years 
of 1839 and 1840 many persons, thrown out of employment, 
were forced to the hard choice between the miseries of ex- 
treme poverty and vice. What the newspapers called a 
wave of crime swept over the State. A Marion county 
grand jury, in its report to the court, solemnly pronounced 
the taverns asylums of immorality and crime rather than 
places of rest and refreshment for travelers. The recent 
General Assembly had required all liquor retailers to secure 
a county license. The law had the effect of concentrating 
the drinking as well as the drunkards in the taverns. With 
the drinkers came their parasites, the gamblers and the 
prostitutes. The report of the grand jury awakened the 
capital like a fire alarm. ^^ Seven days after the report was 
made public, the citizens met in mass meeting. The cen- 
sure of the grand jury was discussed, and it was decided 
that it was not wide of the truth. Immediate action was 
demanded. Under the law the voters had a right, by ma- 
jority remonstrance, to keep the county commissioners 
from issuing a liquor license. A remonstrance was drawn 
up and quickly signed by 224 of the 364 eligible voters of 
the town. In less than three hours the whole work had 
been accomplished, barring saloons from the town for three 
years. 16 

§ 93 Campaign of 1844 

The election of 1840 closed the period of personal poli- 
tics in Indiana.^^- Men of all parties had united to elect 
Harrison. Among his supporters there was little cohesion 
except what was furnished by the personality of the Presi- 
dent. How helpless the Whigs were is shown by their con- 
dition after the death of their leader. Under the lead of 
Clay a bill for a new United States Bank was prepared and 
rushed through Congress. In due time it reached President 
Tyler, who promptly attached his veto. 

The breach produced by the quarrel between Clay and 

15 The report is given in the Indiana Journal, May 29, 1841. 
'^^Incliuna Journal, June 18. 1841. This meeting was held June 5. 
It was presided over by Samuel MeiTill. president of the State Bank. 
17 Adam Leonard, "The Period of Personal Politics in Indiana." Mss. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 



467 




The Democrats car- 
ried all the dlG- 
tricts except the 
Fifth in 1852. 



Indiana in 1852. By E. V. Shockley. 



468 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

President Tyler extended to Indiana. The officers who en- 
joyed the presidential patronage maintained a formal alle- 
giance to the administration. The great majority of the 
voters, together with the party organization, followed Clay. 
They denounced the President for what they chose to call 
his betrayal of the party. 

The Democratic Party profited indirectly by the de- 
moralization of the Whigs, though many of the disaffected 
went over to that party. The struggle of 1840 eliminated 
Van Buren, who had come to be the chief liability of the 
Democratic Party in the West. He had all the weaknesses 
of Jackson without any of Jackson's strength. Neither 
party had any leader at the time, who, like Jackson or Har- 
rison, towered head and shoulders above the multitude. The 
old issues of the Whig Party, the tariff, internal improve- 
ments and the bank, the championing of which had given 
Clay his hold on the party, had lost their appeal. The 
bank had become an impossibility under Tyler. Thousands 
of Indiana Whigs were interested in their own State Bank, 
whose prosperity would be endangered by a new United 
States Bank. The internal improvement issue had turned 
to ashes in the mouths of the Whigs; and the American 
tariff had come to be regarded with suspicion by the farm- 
ing class. 

The period from 1841 to 1844 in Indiana was one of 
political realignment. Not only was there a change in the 
political management of the parties, but the old issues were 
discarded. The secret of the sweeping success of the Demo- 
crats in Indiana in the election of 1844 is due to the fact 
that that party first freed itself from the dead issues of the 
past, and placed itself in harmony with the advanced 
thought of the times. The Whigs tried to win the campaign 
on the same old issues, with the same old machinery, and 
with the same candidates which they had employed since 
1824. They seemed incapable of profiting either by the 
thought or the experience of the previous fifteen years. 

Since the beginning of the rivalry between the Whig 
and the Jacksonian Parties, there had been two opposing 
commercial institutions in the State. The banks and the 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 469 

land offices controlled the money of the State. The Demo- 
crats had always had control of the land offices, and the 
Whigs had always controlled the banks. The General As- 
sembly of 1841 appointed Nathan B. Palmer to make a 
thorough investigation of the condition of the bank.^® j^ 
1843 the General Assembly, still on the trail of the bank, 
took the management of it out of Whig hands and gave it 
to Judge James Morrison, a Democrat. As an offset to 
this advantage the Democrats lost control of the land offices 
from 1841 to 1845. It is to be observed, however, that 
both the bank and the land offices were rapidly losing their 
political influence. 

The opening battle of the new era in Indiana politics 
was the election of the United States senator to succeed 
0. H. Smith, whose term expired in 1843. The two parties 
were almost evenly matched in the General Assembly, so 
evenly that one or two votes would determine the contest. 
On the first ballot, 0. H. Smith, the Whig candidate, re- 
ceived 72 votes ; Tilghman A. Howard, the Democratic can- 
didate, 74; Edward Hannegan, an independent Democratic 
candidate, 3 ; Joseph G. Marshall, a Whig, 1. On the second 
ballot Smith received 75 votes, Howard 74. Daniel Kelso, 
a Whig senator from Switzerland county, voted for Hanne- 
gan. On the sixth ballot the Democrats dropped Howard 
and supported Hannegan, who then received 76 votes and 
was elected. 1^ Kelso was openly charged with selling his 
vote.20 The Whigs by public resolution denounced him. 
It was the last opportunity of the Whig Party to elect a 
United States senator in Indiana. The bitterness was not 
confined to the Whigs, however. Howard and his friends 
never forgave some of the Democratic leaders for their part 

18 Laws of Indiana, 1841, ch. 170. 

19 Senate Journal, 1842, 349-355. 

20 Indianapolis Journal, Jan. 25 and Feb. 1, 1843. These numbers 
contain articles on this remarkable election, for which all members later 
apologized. The 73 Democi-atic members made a statement In the Sen- 
tinel Feb. 7, 1843, over their own signatures, that Governor Whitcomb 
did not help defeat Howard. David Hoover, of Wayne county, classed 
himself as a Democrat, but Kelso, of Switzerland, did not. Of. Sentinel, 
Jan. 31 and Feb. 7. 

(31) 



470 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

in the contest, though it is difficult to see how they could 
have elected him. 

The Democrats swept the State in the election of 1843. 
James Whitcomb succeeded Samuel Bigger in the governor's 
office. He was the first governor elected by the Democrats 
in Indiana. Eight out of the ten congressmen were elected 
on the Democratic ticket. In 1841 the Whigs had elected 
six out of the seven congressmen. This reversal was said 
to be due partly to a Democratic gerrymander by the Gen- 
eral Assembly of 1842.-^ In the State legislature the sen- 
ate in 1843 stood 26 to 24, the house 55 to 45 in favor of 
the Democrats. The Whig junto at Indianapolis was driven 
from power after a continuous administration of eighteen 
years. The Methodist and Presbyterian churches deserted 
the Whigs, especially after it became apparent that Clay 
was to be the candidate in 1844.-- 

As soon as Harrison was dead, Clay and his followers 
began squaring away for the race in 1844. A barbecue in 
Clay's honor was prepared at Indianapolis, October 5, 1842. 
Delegations from all parts of the State visited the capital to 
hear their leader, and to take counsel together concerning 
the approaching contest.--' It was determined to conduct 
the campaign along the old lines. Van Buren was the only 
Democratic candidate above the horizon at that time. Had 
he been the candidate in 1844, the plan of the Whigs might 
have been carried to success, but as it turned out their 
course was fatal. 

Such men as Robert Dale Owen, Joseph A. Wright, An- 
drew Kennedy, James Whitcomb and John W. Davis, 
preaching the new Democracy, were more than a match for 
the old Whigs. They pleaded for human rights, individual 
liberty, private initiative, that it was more the duty of the 
State to care for the unfortunate, the feeble, educate the 
children, and foster individual development, than to con- 

21 Laws of Indiana, 1842. p. 38 ; Doily Sentinel, Feb. 10, 1843. 

22 Western Sun, Sept. 2. 1843. 

23 Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 23, 1842. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 471 

cern itself entirely with aiding bankers, manufacturers and 
transportation companies.- ^ 

Even the hitherto impregnable fortress of a high pro- 
tective tariff was assaulted by the enthusiastic young 
Democrats. James Whitcomb, then a candidate for gov- 
ernor on the Democratic ticket, formerly a supporter of 
Clay, showed by the logic of statistics that workmen in 
the factories were receiving $500 per year, while farm hands 
received only $213. There were ten farm hands in Indi- 
ana to one factory hand. The farm products were not pro- 
tected, but when the farm products were made into manu- 
factured goods, they were highly protected. The wheat 
and corn which the farmer sold were free, but the plow 
which he bought was protected. The best markets for the 
Indiana farmers were among the planters of the South. 
These same planters were being ruined by the high tariff. 
It was the first time the protection policy had been chal- 
lenged in Indiana, and it created considerable alarm in 
the Whig camp.^^ 

The Whigs met in State convention at Indianapolis, 
January 16, 1844, for the purpose of inaugurating the cam- 
paign. There was no apparent lack of enthusiasm. An 
exceptionally strong electoral ticket, headed by Henry S. 
Lane and Joseph G. Marshall, was nominated. A central 
committee of twenty-six members was chosen. A novelty 
was instituted in the form of a board of sixty advocates, 
whose business it was to stump the State. This was the 
beginning of what later came to be known as the speaker's 

24 The following sentiment by Senator William Allen, of Ohio, made 
the rounds of the Democa*atic press in Indiana in 1843-4. It is a fair 
sample of the eloquence of the young Democratic speakers of 1844: 
"Democracy is a sentiment not to be appalled, corrupted nor compro- 
mised. It knows no baseness, cowers at no danger, oppresses no weak- 
ness. Fearless, generous, humane, it rebukes the arrogant, cherishes 
honor, and sympathises with the humble. It asks nothing it will not 
concede. It concedes nothing it does not demand. Destructive only to 
despotism, it is the only preserver of liberty, labor and prosperity. It 
is the sentiment of freedom, equal rights, and equal obligations." West- 
ern Sun, July 1, 1843. 

25 State Journal, April 11, May 12, May 19, May 23, May 28, 1843. 



472 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

bureau.^" The convention also appointed sixty delegates, 
five from each of the twelve judicial districts, to the Na- 
tional Convention.-" The Whigs met in the hall of the 
House of Representatives. In their enthusiasm, while 
cheering the speakers, many of the members stood on the 
tops of the desks, leaving the imprint of their hob-nailed 
shoes on the furniture. The Indianapolis Sentinel on this 
account referred to the convention as a "hob-nailed" mob. 
The Whigs accepted the title of "Hob-nails" without 
demur. -s 

Whig campaign papers were established in almost every 
county, backed financially by the Whig County Clubs. The 
Central Committee planned nineteen mass meetings in the 
different parts of the State, each to be the occasion of a 
barbecue and at least three addresses.-^ Innumerable speak- 
ings, pole raisings, and rallies served to increase the gen- 
eral interest and excitement. 

In the matter of substantial argument the Whigs were 
weak. By agreement Clay and Van Buren had eliminated 
the Texas question. Tyler had tried in vain to build a 
party around that issue. When Tyler failed his followers, 
to the great dismay of Clay, rallied around Polk and beat 
Van Buren in the convention. The Whigs of Indiana de- 
nounced the scheme to annex Texas as a venture uncalled 
for by the people; entirely southern in its origin and sup- 
port; unconstitutional; an unwarranted aggression upon a 
weak neighbor; assumption of a vast debt for the direct 

26 Loganspoi-t Telegraph, Feb. 10, 1844 ; Indianapolis Whig Rifle, Mar. 
14. 1844 ; Indianapolis Journal, May 25, 1844. 

27 Indianapolis Journal, Mar. 23, 1844. 

28 Indianapolis Journal, April 13, 1844. 

29 Indianapolis Journal, Aug. 24, 1844. The times and dates were 
as follows: Evansville, Sept. 14; Princeton. Sept. 18; Washington, 
Sept. 21; Corydon, Sept. 25; Charlestowu, Sept. 28; Bedford, Oct. 19; 
Madison. Oct. 2; Napoleon, Oct. 5; Cambridge City, Oct. 12; Shelby- 
yille, Oct. 9; Indianapolis, Oct. 22; Andersontown, Oct. 15; Rockville, 
Oct. 2; Lafayette, Oct. 5; Logansport. Oct. 8; Goshen. Oct. 16; Fort 
Wayne, Oct. 12; Laporte, Oct. 19; Terre Haute, Oct. 28. Henry S. Lane, 
R. W. Thompson. Hugh O'Neal, H. P. Riddle, Samuel C. Sample, John 
D. Defrees, Samuel Bigger, David Wallace, Albert F. White, O. H. 
Smith, Samuel Parker, Joseph G. Marshall and George G. Dunn were 
the principal speakers. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 473 

benefit of a few Americans who held Texan bonds ; in brief, 
as a policy that had no other purpose or justification than 
the spread of slavery.^o 

Besides the tariff and bank, the Whigs hoped to secure 
wide support among Jackson Democrats on their proposi- 
tion to distribute the proceeds of the public lands. This 
had once been looked on with favor by Jackson and Ben- 
ton.31 jji the present condition of the State treasury it 
was thought that it would appeal with great strength to 
Indiana voters. The Democrats opposed the whole policy 
by which the national government would either assume any 
part of the State debts or distribute the proceeds of the 
public land sales. James Whitcomb said: "The effects 
which would result from the distribution would be deleteri- 
ous to the best interests of the laboring classes. It is 
nothing better than a direct scheme of bribery."''- 

A variation of the distribution policy was known as 
"the William Cost Johnson plan" from the name of its au- 
thor. By it the United States would issue national stock 
(currency) to the amount of $200,000,000, which would be 
distributed to the Western States in proportion to the public 
lands in each and would be received by the United States 
in payment for the lands. Under this plan Indiana would 
receive $8,519,823, which, it was urged, would go a long 
way on the State debt of $12,751,000."^3 

The Democrats of Indiana were not backward about 
beginning the campaign in Indiana. As early as July 4, 
1843, Senator Lewis Cass visited the State, presumably to 
deliver the oration at Fort Wayne on completion of the 

30 Indianapolis Journal, June 29, 1844. "We say this is a question 
that rises above all party. It means union or disunion; the free North 
will never submit to it; the free West will not submit to such a tax 
merely to spread slavery. Our free laborers are in favor of a tariff. 
The admission of Texas is a step toward the abandonment of our tariff 
system." — Editorial. 

31 Jackson's message, 1829, quoted in the Journal April 6, 1844. 

32 Indianapolis Journal, May 4, 1844. 

33 Indianapolis Journal, April 6, 1844 ; also April 13, 1844, 



474 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Wabash and Erie canal, but really to arouse the Democrats 
for the approaching strugg-le.^^ 

The Democratic State convention met at Indianapolis 
on the anniversary of the victory of New Orleans, Jan- 
uary 8, for the purpose of organization. An electoral 
ticket w^as nominated.^^ The general conduct of the cam- 
paign was similar to that of the Whigs. There were, how- 
ever, no joint debates. As indicated above, the party speak- 
ers did not usually discuss the same issues. 

On the tariff, internal improvement, and bank ques- 
tions, Polk had acted quite as often with the Whigs as with 
the Democrats. Governor Whitcomb, who discussed the 
tariff oftener than any other Democrat, did not oppose the 
policy so much as he opposed giving its benefit to the manu- 
facturing interests alone. Senator Hannegan, by far the 
most eloquent speaker in the State at the time, aroused 
enthusiasm among the young voters by his presentation 
of the Texas and Oregon questions. Each party had, with- 
out success, made an effort in Congress to get appropria- 
tions for the National Road and the Wabash and Erie 
Canal.36 

The Free Soil vote worried both parties. The followers 
of Clay made every possible concession without avail. A 
Free Soil paper, the Indiana Freeman, was established at 
the capital and a spirited campaign waged. In the last 
issue of the Indiana State Journal before the election, the 
Whig chairman, 0. H. Smith, published a two-column ap- 

34 His entire si^eech is given in tlie Indianapolis Sentinel, July 25, 
1843. 

35 Logansport Telegraph, Jan. 20, 1844. This ticket was as follows : 
Tilghman A. Howard, James G. Reed, Dr. Wm. A. Bowles, Dr. Elijah 
Newman, J. M. Johnson. Samuel E. Perkins, W. W. Wick, Paris C. Dun- 
ning, Henry W. Ellsworth, Charles W. Cathcart and Lucian P. Ferry. 
To these sli )uld be added Governor Whitcomb, Lieutenant Governor 
Jesse Briglil, Senator Hannegan, J. W. Davis, T. J. Henly, R. D. Owen 
and a few others, to make up the list of Democratic orators. 

36 For a statement of the principles of the Democratic Party see Vin- 
cennes Western Sun, Nov. 2. 1844. The leading Democratic paper was 
the State Sentinel, edited by G. A. and J. P. Chapman. On the Cum- 
berland Road and Wabash and Erie Canal, see Senator Albert S. White, 
in Indianapolis Journal, May 7 and May 25, and John W. Davis in the 
Journal April 27. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 475 

peal to the Free Soilers to support Clay. He published a 
letter, purporting to have been by Birney, the Free Soil 
candidate, which stated that Birney was a Democrat and 
had entered the race at the suggestion of the Democratic 
leader in order to hold the anti-slavery vote from Clay. 
Birney promptly pronounced the letter, known in history 
as the "Garland" letter, a "forgery."^^ 

Both parties made bids for the emigrant vote. A German 
paper, the Republican, was started at Cincinnati by the 
Whigs. Thousands of copies were distributed free to Indi- 
ana Germans. A German Democratic association was or- 
ganized in Indianapolis. To the disgust of both parties, 
the Germans refused to get excited, and went about their 
business much as if there were no contest going on.^^ Cor- 
responding attempts were made to influence the Irish 
voters.^'^ 

The results of the elections were unfavorable to the 
Whigs. The August elections returned an equal number 
of each party to the State Senate, but a majority of ten 
Whigs to the House.^o The presidential elections in No- 
vember gave the Whigs 67,867 votes, the Democrats 70,181, 
and the Free Soilers 2,106, a Democratic plurality of 2,314 
and an absolute majority of 208.^*1 

§ 94 Political Demoralization 

When the General Assembly convened December 2, 
1844, a combination of Whigs and Democrats, on the ninth 
ballot, elected Alexander C. Stevenson, a Whig of Putnam 
county, speaker over the veteran Whig politician, Milton 
Stapp.42 

37 Indianapolis State Journal, Nov. 2, 1844. 

38 Indiana Journal, April 13 and Aug. 24, 1844. 

39 Whig Rifle, July 8, 1844. 

40 Indiana Journal, Nov. 9, 1844, gives a full list of members, vrith 
political affiliations. 

. 41 Indiana Journal, Nov. 30, 1844. The vote is given by counties. 
There is great difficulty in classifying the members politically. When 
the General Assembly tried to elect a United States senator later it was 
found that the House favored a Whig, and the Senate was a tie. 
42 Indiana Journal, Dec. 7, 1844. 



476 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The election of a United States senator to succeed Al- 
bert S. White of Lafayette was the principal political duty 
which fell upon the Assembly of 1844. Early in the ses- 
sion there began to appear indications that the Senate 
would refuse to go into joint session for the purpose. The 
Whigs paid no attention to the rumors until a four-column 
editorial in the last Sentinel of the year advocated indefinite 
postponement of the election. The Sentinel urged in favor 
of the movement that the Whigs had so gerrymandered the 
State in 1840 that the Democrats did not get a fair pro- 
portion of the representatives. As proof of the fact they 
pointed out that they had elected all State officers and eight 
of the ten congressmen in 1843 and had carried the State 
for Polk in 1844. In spite of this they had lost the Gen- 
eral Assembly.^2 The Whigs regarded the whole proceed- 
ings as a bluff until January 9, 1845, when the Senate, by 
a strict party vote, 25 to 25, Lieutenant Governor Bright 
giving the casting vote, decided not to go into an elec- 
tion at all. The Whigs ascribed the action of the Senate 
to the ambition of Governor Whitcomb to succeed Senator 
White. The whole subject reflects little lustre on the po- 
litical morality of either party. The Whigs had threat- 
ened such a bolt two years before, when Hannegan was 
elected. A Democratic Assembly had recently enacted a 
law making it the duty to elect a senator at the session 
immediately preceding the expiration of the senatorial 
term. 

The August election of 1845 confirmed the Democrats 
in their prediction that the Assembly would be Democratic. 
Of the newly elected State senators ten were Whigs and 
seven Democrats, leaving that body a tie, while in the House 
there was a clear Democratic majority of ten.^^ The Whigs 
succeeded in electing only two congressmen, Caleb B. Smith 
in the Fourth District, and E. W. McGaughey in the 

'iS Indiana Journal, Jan. 1, 1845; the Indiana Journal, Jan. 29, 1845, 
contains a siDeech on the subject by John D. Defrees, delivered in the 
Senate Jan. 6. The speaker goes into the political history of the last 
four Assemblies. 

44 Indiana Journal, Aug. 27, 1845. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 477 

Seventh, the latter defeating Joseph A. Wright by 151 
votes. There was little at issue in any of the contests of 
the year. 

The Whig Party was rapidly waning in strength. There 
seemed to be a clique of ex-officeholders, high up in the 
councils of the party, who were determined to rule the 
party or ruin it. When they failed to nominate their man 
in convention they brought out an independent candidate, 
thus insuring Democratic success.^^ The Democratic Party 
likewise was not without its internal dissentions, largely 
of the same nature. There was the Hunker-Barnburner 
division; the Bright- Whitcomb jealousy; and the Wright- 
Hannegan feud. The first of the divisions was between 
the conservative wing, represented by Chapman and the 
Sentinel, and the progressive wing, represented by John 
W. Davis, S. F. Covington of the Madison Courier, and 
Morrison, formerly of the Indiana Democrat. The second 
division, between Whitcomb and Bright, was the first indi- 
cation of the slavery question in Indiana Democracy. 
Bright was a pro-slavery slave owner, while Whitcomb was 
a Free Soiler. The last mentioned dissention was a pri- 
vate quarrel due to personal political ambitions. 

§ 95 The Free Soilers in Indiana, 1846-1850 

The year 1846 found the Democrats and Whigs engaged 
in a gubernatorial struggle, with James Whitcomb a can- 
didate for reelection on the Democratic ticket and Joseph 
G. Marshall of Madison heading the Whig ticket. The 
Whig convention had met at -Indianapolis January 9, 1846, 
and nominated Marshall and Godlove S. Orth on a plat- 
form referring rather vaguely to the payment of the State 
debt, so that the reputation of the State might be preserved, 
and to the control of all of Oregon, which justly belonged 
to the United States.^^ The Democrats met, as usual, on 
January 8, and nominated Whitcomb and Paris C. Dun- 
ning of Bloomington, on a platform of many specific 

45 See a series of articles in the Indiana Journal, Oct. 8, 15, 29, 1845. 
^^ Indiana Journal, Jan. 10, 1846. 



478 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

planks, of which "no banks," "no internal improvements," 
"no State debts," "an ad valorem tariff," "no State loans," 
"payment of honest debts," "hard money," "no special bank 
charters," "no connection between state and church," were 
a few.'*" 

The campaign was waged on personalities, though, in 
the history of the State, it would be difficult to point out a 
campaign in which two cleaner men contended for the office 
of governor. Whitcomb was attacked most severely for 
his conduct with reference to his appointments to the su- 
preme bench, while Marshall was most effectively criticized 
for his connection with the internal improvement policy.^^ 
Orth withdrew from the race May 4, and the Whig Central 
Committee substituted Alexander C. Stevenson of Putnam 
county in his place. Besides the personalities, the "Butler 
Bill" was widely discussed. Neither party was able to raise 
any great amount of enthusiasm. Whitcomb was success- 
ful over Marshall by 4,037 votes; the Free Soilers under 
Stevens received 2,278 votes, almost entirely, it seems, at the 
expense of the Whigs.^^ 

The congressional elections of 1847 form a prelude to 
the presidential campaign of 1848. The Mexican War had 
absorbed practically all of the political energy of the people 
since the spring of 1846. The Whigs at once attacked the 
Polk administration for its conduct of the war. Especially 
had the President laid himself open to hostile criticism by 
appointing Democrats to the higher positions in the mili- 
tary service and for attempting to secure votes against the 
Wilmot Proviso by a skillful use of his appointive power.^*' 
As a result of their searching criticism the administration 
was soon thrown on the defensive. 

In State politics the Whigs had made a fairly creditable 

47 Madison Courier, Jan. 17, 1846. Resolutions of the Democratic 
Editorial Association. 

48 For a good statement of the attack on Whitcomb see Indiana Jour- 
nal, July 1. 1846, and March IS, 1846. For a statement of the charges 
against Marshall see Journal, May 13, 1846; see also Journal, April 22 
and April 29. 

49 Indiana Journal, Aug. 26. 1846. 

50 Indiana State Journal, Mar. 24, June 9, 1846. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 479 

record during the last four years, while the Democratic 
organization had suffered from the fights over the "Butler 
Bills," the senatorial elections, the appointments of su- 
preme judges, and lastly over the Wilmot Proviso struggle 
in Congress. 51 

Many of the Indiana congressmen were in political 
trouble with their constituencies. As a result of the Mexi- 
can War the National Treasury was empty ; so that appro- 
priations for the improvement of the western rivers, for 
the continuation of the Cumberland Road, for the harbor 
at Michigan City could not be made. Several appropria- 
tion bills for these improvements had been passed by Con- 
gress in 1845, but had met the veto of the President. The 
congressional candidates in Indiana, especially in the Ninth 
District, had argued to their constituents that President 
Polk would not veto such appropriations voted by Demo- 
crats. The facts had not borne out their prophecy.^- In 
the First and Eighth Districts the respective Democratic 
candidates, Robert Dale Owen and John Petit, were both 
infidels, for which they were being ruthlessly persecuted 
by their Whig opponents. Owen was a man of the highest 
type who gave no occasion for attack, but Petit took pleas- 
ure in obtruding his religious convictions. For instance, 
he annually introduced resolutions in Congress to dispense 
with the chaplain. In the Sixth District there was a three- 
cornered fight in the Democratic convention. Dr. D. M. 
Dobson of Owen county, George W. Carr of Lawrence, and 
John W. Davis of Parke county engaged in a life and death 
political struggle. Dr. Davis, the only one who could have 
been elected, withdrew after the third convention had failed 
to make a nomination. Dr. Dobson was nominated at 
Bloomfield, July 8. The long fight disgusted the voters and 
left the party without the organization to make a success- 
ful contest. In the Seventh District the bitter feud be- 
tween Senator Hannegan and Joseph A. Wright deprived 

51 Platform of the Fifth District, Indiana State Journal, June 23, 
1847. 

52 Indiana Journal, May 26, 1847. 



480 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

the latter of the united support of the Democrats, so that 
he was defeated. 

The results of the election were a disapointment to both 
parties. The combined vote of the Whigs in all the dis- 
tricts was 67,723, of the Democrats 67,216. Thus although 
the Whigs carried the State by a majority of 507, they 
elected only four of the ten congressmen. Had the Whig 
majority in the Fourth District, where Caleb B. Smith de- 
feated Charles Test by a majority of 1,368, been prop- 
erly distributed, it would have elected five more Whig con- 
gressmen. On the other hand, George G. Dunn and R. W. 
Thompson were elected on the Whig tickets in the Sixth and 
Seventh Districts, respectively, by majorities of 292 and 
178. The election was very close, with the Whigs enjoy- 
ing a moral victory.^^ 

The Liberty Party does not seem to have made an active 
canvass. Meetings were held in the districts and the voters 
aligned themselves with that candidate who gave most 
promise of carrying out their principles. Their platform 
opposed admitting any more slave States, the acquisition 
of any more slave territory, and the further prosecution 
of the War with Mexico. On these questions they de- 
manded the views of the candidates and cast their votes 
accordingly.^^ 

The opening of the campaign of 1848 found both par- 
ties in Indiana eager as usual for the contest, but doubtful 
as to candidates. President Polk had been disqualified by 
his pro-slavery policy for the race in any of the Northern 
States. The hostile feeling aroused by the Wilmot Proviso 
would not be quieted. The course of events thoroughly 
aroused the anti-slavery Democrats in the North. With- 
out their support it was impossible to win in Indiana. Of 
the six Democratic congressmen then representing the 
State not one had received a majority as high as 500. It 
was felt by all of them that the pro-slavery program of 

53 Indiana State Journal June 29, July 7, Sept. 10, 1847. 

54 Indiana State Journal, June 23, 1847. A Whig platform, Ninth 
District, is given in the Journal, May 26, 1847. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 481 

the Polk administration was jeopardizing their political 
lives. On the other hand, it was felt just as strongly that 
it was impossible to carry a Southern State on a platform 
endorsing the Wilmot Proviso. The defeat of the adminis- 
tration would throw all the national patronage in the State 
into the hands of the Whigs, thus endangering all the fed- 
eral officeholders in the State. It was not the first nor the 
last time that the elective and appointive federal office- 
holders of the State found themselves at loggerheads. It 
is hardly necessary to point out that the appointive office- 
holders were pro-slavery and the elective anti-slavery, at 
least in policy. The Democratic press, so far as it was not 
subsidized by public printing and postoffice appointments, 
was generally favorable toward the anti-slavery policy. 

The Whigs were not responsible for any part of the ad- 
ministration policy in securing new territory for slavery. 
So long, therefore, as they merely opposed the pro-slavery 
propaganda of Polk, they held the moral sympathy of the 
majority of the voters of Indiana. On the other hand, as 
soon as they faced the problem of a national campaign with 
its national platform and national candidates, they found 
themselves in the same predicament as the Democrats. In- 
diana Whigs were called upon to support a platform and a 
candidate that could also carry such States as Kentucky 
and Louisiana. A Whig President could not be elected 
without the support of many Southern States. 

There was only one party with a logical program and 
that was the Liberty Party, then coming to be known as 
the Free Soil Party. It opposed the further spread of 
slavery and the further acquisition of slave territory. But 
having no reasonable hope of electing any of its candidates, 
it had no strong appeal to the mass of Indiana voters. Un- 
der these circumstances the contest took on all the fascina- 
tion of a game of skill. 

The Whigs of Wayne county met on Christmas day, 
1847, and condemned by resolution the annexation of Texas 
and the War with Mexico, but praised the soldiers who 
fought the war. They endorsed Taylor for the presi- 



482 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

dency--^-* These resolutions might do very well for Indiana^ 
but it was plain they would not serve as a platform south 
of the Ohio. Furthermore there was a slight contradiction 
apparent between the candidate and the platform. How- 
ever, it fairly represents the contradictory nature of the 
campaign in the State. 

The farther-sighted Whig leaders recognized that the 
Free Soilers held the balance of power in the State, and 
that few of them would ever vote for a slave-holder. Judge 
McLean of Cincinnati seemed on that account the most 
promising candidate. All agreed that he was not the choice 
of the Whigs of the State, and could not get the vote of 
the State in the national convention. This prediction was 
fairly well carried out. In the national convention McLean 
failed to receive a vote from Indiana. On the first ballot 
Scott received 9, Clay 2, Taylor 1. On the fourth and last 
Scott received 4, Clay 1 and Taylor 7 of the votes of the 
Indiana delegates. An electoral ticket had already been 
selected and a central committee of fifteen members, one 
from each congressional district and five from the Fifth.^^ 

The Democrats met as usual at Indianapolis, January 8, 
and laid their plans for the campaign. There were only 
twenty-one counties represented. Little enthusiasm was 
manifested. The two parties seemed much alike in that re- 
gard. Lewis Cass was their favorite for the presidency.^" 

The Free Soilers were unable to support either of the 
old parties and therefore organized for a separate cam- 
paign. Their State convention was held at Indianapolis, 
July 26. After the usual work had been attended to, they 
drev/ up a set of resolutions declaring that there was no 
difference between the old parties on the slavery question ; 
that they would stand by the constitution, but would oppose 
the spread of slavery; that they would stand by the plat- 
form of the Buffalo convention and would support Van 
Buren; that the Free Soil platform should be a test in 

55 Tri-weeMy Journal, Jan. 10, 1847. 

56 Tri-weeldy State Journal, April 26, May 3, June 16 and Aug. 2, 
1848. 

57 Tri-tveekly Journal, Jan. 10, 1848. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 483 

supporting State candidates. Ovid Butler and Rawson 
Vaile of Wayne county and John B. Seamans of Lafayette 
were the active members of the State committee.^s 

The conduct of the campaign was not different from that 
of 1840 and 1844. Cass clubs and Rough and Ready clubs 
were organized in all parts of the State. Barbecues and 
joint discussions were common. The Whigs made a feature 
of a celebration at Fort Harrison, September 5, the thirty- 
sixth anniversary of Taylor's brilliant feat of arms there.^*^ 
Little interest or enthusiasm could be aroused. Taylor was 
not popular on account of his severe criticism of the Sec- 
ond Regiment at Buena Vista. Cass was not popular on 
account of his pro-slavery platform.*^'^ Each party made 
frantic appeals to the Free Soilers — the Whigs, to quit 
their party and join the Whig; the Democrats, to stand by 
Van Buren to the last. The Whigs pointed out to them 
that it was the defection to Birney that elected Polk. That 
now every vote for Van Buren helped to fasten slavery in 
the territories; that Van Buren himself was the original 
"dough face" and had no principles of his own.^^i The Free 
Soilers stood to their guns in spite of all appeals and the 
State vote went to Cass by a plurality of 4,538, Van Buren 
receiving 8,100 votes. ^'^ Of the 11,402 votes cast above the 
number in 1844, the Free Soilers had gained 6,000. The 
fruits of the victory, however, went to the defeated Whigs. 

The Democrats controlled the General Assembly. A 
spirited contest at once began for Hannegan's seat in the 
United States Senate. Governor Whitcomb, Robert Dale 
Owen, Senator Hannegan and E. M. Chamberlain were the 

58 Tri-iveelcly Journal, Aug. 4, 1S4S. 

59 Tri-weeklij Journal, Sept. 15, 1848. 

60 "Democrats wlio bave nevei* lifted a finger for the party or its 
principles and whose integrity is doubtful, and who owe all their super- 
abundant riches to truckling between the parties, are expecting a rain 
of soup and are holding their dishes high." Editorial in the State Sen- 
tinel, quoted by Journal, Sept. 29. On the other hand Editor Defrees 
of the Journal wrote editorially Aug. 4 : "Next Monday is election day 
and we fear the Whigs are not prepared for it. While our opponents 
are active and jubilant, you are all asleep." 

61 Tri-wceMy Journal, Aug. 30, 1848. 

62 Daily Journal, Dec. 4, Dec. 19, 1848. 



484 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Democratic aspirants. Each was required by the Demo- 
cratic members to answer the following questions: Has 
Congress the constitutional power to exclude slavery from 
the territories so long as they remain a territory? And if 
such power exists are you in favor of so excluding slavery? 
These remind one of the propositions which Lincoln, ten 
years later, put to Judge Douglas, and which the latter 
feared to answer. All the candidates answered in the af- 
firmative. They were then asked if they would abide by 
instructions of the General Assembly, and all assented. 
They were finally asked if they would go into caucus and 
abide by the result. Again all answered affirmatively. On 
the fourth caucus ballot, Whitcomb received 49 votes, Owen 
12, Chamberlain 6, Hannegan 10. There were eighty-two 
of the eighty-seven Democratic members present.*^^ 

§ 96 The Last Struggles of the Whig Party 

From 1835 to 1852 there was one continuous political 
campaign in Indiana. Candidates, platforms and politi- 
cians came and went, but the contest raged without inter- 
mission. The election of members to the General Assembly 
took place in August, 1848, the presidential election fol- 
lowed in November ; the election of a United States senator 
came before the General Assembly in December ; in January 
the parties held their State conventions preparatory to elect- 
ing a governor in August; during April and May congres- 
sional conventions were held in the districts to select can- 
didates for the congressional election in August; during 
May and June candidates for the General Assembly were 
selected. The active campaign began about June 1, though 
the gubernatorial candidates frequently took the field as 
early as May 1.®* 

The Whig State convention met in Indianapolis, Jan- 
uary 3. The usual formalities of a convention were car- 

63 Daily Journal, Dec. 6, Dec. 15, Dec. 20, 1S4S. 

64 See itinerary of J. A. Wright, Madison Courier, May 2, June 2, 
1849. It might be added that two State-wide referendums. one on a 
school question and one on calling a constitutional convention, were be- 
fore the voters at this time. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 485 

ried out. One of the rules provided that, in voting, each 
congressional district should cast three votes as determined 
by all the voters present from that district. A platform 
was reported by Thomas Bowling of Terre Haute.*^^ Elisha 
Embree of Princeton, who had defeated Robert Dale Owen 
for Congress in 1847 in the First District, was nominated 
for governor, and Thomas S. Stanfield for lieutenant gov- 
ernor. 

The Democratic convention met at Indianapolis, Jan- 
uary 8. There were three candidates for governor — Joseph 
A. Wright of Parke county, James H. Lane of Lawrence- 
burg and E. M. Chamberlain of Goshen. An agreement 
was reached among the supporters of the two first-named 
candidates by which Wright was nominated for governor 
and Lane for lieutenant governor.^^ 

As soon as Judge Embree, who was then in Washington, 
heard of his nomination, he at once wrote John D. Defrees, 
State chairman, declining, stating as his reason that he 
preferred to serve in Congress, and that he had promised 
his friends in the First District to be their candidate again. 
The State chairman immediately called a meeting of the 
State Central Committee, by whom a new convention was 
ordered. It met May 3, and nominated John A. Matson of 
Brookville for governor.*^''' 

The Free Soilers, under the name of the "Free Democ- 
racy," met at Indianapolis January 20. A strong effort 
was made to have the convention endorse Judge Embree, 
but without success. The failure of this, perhaps, deter- 
mined the latter to withdraw from the Whig ticket. The 
Free Soilers nominated James H. Cravens of Ripley county 
to head their ticket, with John W. Wright of Cass county as 
his lieutenant.*'^ They decided to combine on local tickets 
with that party which would give them most consideration. 
In some counties they had run second in 1848, while in 
many they held the balance of power. They hoped by a 

■65 Daily Journal, Jan. 5, 1849. 

66 Daily Journal, Jan. 10, 1849. 

67 Daily Journal, Mar. 12, April 2, May 4, May 28, 1849. 
^^ Daily Journal, Jan. 20 and 31, 1849. 

(32) 



486 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

skillful use of their votes to secure several seats in the Gen- 
eral Assembly. In general, they demanded the application 
of the Wilmot Proviso in organizing new territory. They 
opposed admitting any more slave States, and they insisted 
that Congress free itself of guilt by abolishing slavery 
wherever it had power, especially in the District of Colum- 
bia.*^'^ The weakness in their campaign was that they were 
contesting for a State office on a strictly national platform. 
The same criticism applies with almost equal force to the 
other parties. 

The issue of the struggle turned almost entirely on 
slavery. The Democrats had supported Cass, who, in his 
Nicholson letter, had favored spreading slavery as much 
as possible in order to mitigate its evils. Wright dodged 
the slavery question as far as he could, usually advocating 
the non-interference doctrine. On State issues, such as 
popular education, calling a constitutional convention, pro- 
viding for biennial assemblies, he felt safer. Matson stood 
squarely by the Wilmot Proviso. He favored a constitu- 
tional convention, and especially advocated the popular 
election of judges and postmasters. In general, the Free 
Soilers fused with the Democrats. In the Fourth District, 
a Free Soil candidate, George W. Julian, aided by Demo- 
cratic votes, was elected to Congress. In the election, the 
"Van Burenites" supported Wright, leaving the Whig can- 
didate with his normal Whig vote."*^ The feature of the 
campaign was the strenuous canvass made by Joseph A. 
Wright. He made over 100 speeches in eighty-one counties, 
visiting the remotest parts of the State. The average 
length of each address was two hours. 

The decisive defeat of the Whigs in 1849 left little life 
in the party. With only one congressman out of ten, with 
no senator, with no control in the State government, the 
political outlook was indeed gloomy for the party in Indi- 
es Daii^ Journal, June 8, June 11, 1849. 

70 The results of the election were : Wright. 76,897 : iSIatson, 66,854 ; 
Cravens, 2.978. The Whigs lost all the congressmen but one. E. M. Mc- 
Gaughey. a Whig, defeating Grafton Cookerly in the Seventh. Tri- 
weekly Journal, Aug. 17, Aug. 24, Aug. 29, 1849. 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 487 

ana. It was unable to take any aggressive steps on any 
question. The constitutional convention and education en- 
grossed public attention in the State from 1850 till the close 
of the convention in 1851. By championing both these 
measures the Democrats were able to strengthen their po- 
litical hold on the State. In 1850 they elected a safe ma- 
jority of the assemblymen; in 1851 they elected two-thirds 
of the assemblymen, and a like proportion of delegates to 
the constitutional convention. In the latter year, however, 
the Whigs succeeded in electing two congressmen, Samuel 
W. Parker in the Fourth, and Samuel Brenton in the Tenth 
District. The combined Democratic majority in the ten 
districts, however, was 9,4Qd.'^^ 

Success to the Democrats was attended with grave dan- 
ger to the party. The assistance and co-operation of the 
Free Soilers had been courted ever since 1844. The latter 
came to feel that they had contributed essentially to the 
success of the party, and they therefore began boldly to 
demand a hearing in its councils. The smouldering coals 
of Free Soilism began to blaze up smartly. There was only 
need of a little gust of passion to start an uncontrollable 
fire. The gust was not to come till 1854, but in the mean- 
time it required all the political acumen and forbearance 
in the party to keep the flame down. 

The politicians and perhaps a majority of the rank and 
file of the old parties welcomed the compromise measures 
of 1850. The slavery agitation had reached the pitch where 
it was causing uneasiness to thoughtful men. So willingly 
did the leaders abandon the question that there appeared 
to the Abolitionists to be an agreement among them to 
eliminate it. 

The election of 1852 was the first under the new con- 
stitution. For the third time in the State history a guber- 
natorial and presidential campaign had fallen on the same 
year.'- Never before had there been so many candidates 
in the field at once. 

71 Indiana Journal, Aug. 30, 1851. 

72 Monroe and Jennings were elected in 1S16, but the presidential 
electors were chosen in the legislature. 



488 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

The Democratic State convention met in Masonic Hall, 
Indianapolis, February 24, 1852. The party was in good 
spirits, but there was no excess of enthusiasm. Governor 
Wright had made many enemies in his own party and many 
friends in the Whig party by fearlessly opposing the free 
banks and the liquor interests. No one appeared to con- 
test the nomination with him. For lieutenant governor, 
Ashbel P. Williard, an eloquent young lawyer of New Al- 
bany, was chosen. Besides these there were now ten more 
State officials to be elected on the State ticket. After these 
had been selected, the convention endorsed the compromise 
measures of the recent Congress. This was not done with- 
out serious protest, voiced by such papers as the Lafayette 
Courier, the Indianapolis Stateman, the Goshen Democrat, 
and others of the Free Soil persuasion. 

The convention emphasized sharply the cleavage be- 
tween the two wings of the party. The northern part of 
the State, where Free Soilism was strong, was not repre- 
sented on the ticket. 

The Whig State convention assembled at Indianapolis, 
February 26, 1852. As usual there was plenty of speech- 
making, but not very much real enthusiasm. There was 
no avowed candidate, and Nicholas McCarty, a prominent 
merchant of Indianapolis, was placed at the head of the 
ticket. William Williams of Warsaw took second place. 
After filling up the rest of the ticket, principally with men 
from the northern part of the State, a featureless platform 
was adopted. In its general attitude the party stood for 
about the same policy as the Democratic. As popular cam- 
paigners the Whigs were hopelessly outclassed. Had the 
Whigs nominated George G. Dunn, R. W. Thompson, or 
some man of that class, they might have won. On the 
hustings Joseph A. Wright has had few equals in the State. 

The Free Soilers held their State convention at Indian- 
apolis, May 17. Each township in the State was requested 
to send a delegate. The party was composed of Abolition- 
ists, Wilmot Proviso Democrats, Van Burenites, and Anti- 
Fugitive-Slaw-Law Whigs. A. L. Robinson of Vanderburg 



POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852 489 

county and J. P. Milliken of Dearborn were the candidates. 
The new party was bitterly opposed by both old parties, 
the Democrats having changed their attitude toward it de- 
cidedly since 1848. 

The national candidates added no zest to the campaign 
in the State. Scott failed to elicit any enthusiasm, while 
Pierce, like Polk in 1844, was an unknown person. The 
leading Whig papers of Indiana had in a forlorn way sup- 
ported Scott for the last year, but not in the way they had 
formerly supported Clay and Harrison. 

The State campaign lacked all the spectacular elements 
of 1840, and the earnestness of 1832 or 1844. It was en- 
tirely machine made. The Free Soilers were not allowed a 
hearing, and there was no issue between the other parties 
sufficient to arouse any passion. The usual number of cam- 
paign speeches, rallies, and barbecues were held. The State 
election came off October 12. As the results trickled in 
slowly it became manifest that the Whig Party had met 
disaster. Only one congressman out of eleven, Samuel Par- 
ker of the Fifth, had been elected. Wright had defeated 
McCarty by 18,935 majority, while the third party had 
polled only 3,303 votes. The returns from the presidential 
polls were equally discouraging to the Whigs. Pierce had 
received 95,299 votes, Scott 80,901 and Hale, on the Free 
Soil ticket, 6,934. The Whigs carried twenty-one counties. 
They were almost careless of the results and received the 
reports calmly. They had supported the party, not through 
belief in its platform or its candidate, but rather through 
a spirit of opposition to the Democratic Party. The Demo- 
crats were not elated by their success. The bitter dissen- 
tions which had been hushed with difficulty during the 
campaign at once broke out. 

The campaign was the last in which either the Whig or 
Free Soil Party entered actively. The Whig Party went 
to its grave with very few mourners, and they professional. 
The Free Soilers joined with the liberated Whigs and dis- 
affected Democrats to form a new party. The old order 
was dead, the new order had begun. Like the morning sun- 



490 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

shine after a night of storm the State appeared after the 
campaign of 1852. With a new constitution, with new 
party affiliations unshackled by professional politicians, 
with new institutions, and renewed courage, her citizens 
looked to the future full of hope and assuranceJ^ 

73 The facts of this campaign have been talien from the Indianapolis 
Journal and Sentinel, the Madison Courier and the Logansport Pharos. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 



Albach, James R., Annals of The West. Pittsburg, 1856. 

Ajlden, George Henry, New Governments West of the Alleghany Moun- 
tains. Madison. 

Alerding, Rev. Herman, The Diocese of Vincennes. 

Alvord, C W., "Gibault aud tjie Submission of Post Vincennes," Amer- 
ican Historical Review, XIV, 544. 

Alvord, C. W., Old Kaskaskia Records. Springfield, 1909. This contains 
many important papers relating to the early Iiistoiy of Vincennes. 

American Almanac and Repository of Useful Knowledge. Thirty-three 
vols. Boston, 1830-1862. Statistical. 

American Archives. This is a collection of papers from the old Con- 
federation Government and precede the Am. Statp Papers. It con- 
tains, many valuable papers relating to Western and Indiana 
History. 

America/n Historical Register, March, 1896, has an account of Lafay- 
, ette's visit to the United States in 1824-25, 

American State Papers, Docmnents Legislative and Executive. 38 
vols. Washington, 1832-1861. These consist of papers selected from 
the archives at Washington, aud printed by the government. They 
are made up largely of letters and petitions to the government 
officials. Documentary. 

Annual Register. An English Magazine. Contemporary. 

Avery, E. M., History of the United States. Cleveland, 1904-10. 

Audubon, Maria A., Western Journal, Ed. by Frank H. Hodder. Cleve- 
land, 1906. 

Baird, Capt. L. C, "General Lafayette's Visit to Indiana," in Indiana 
Magazine of History, II, 195. 

Baker, George A., The St. Josepli-Kankakee Portage. South Bend, 1899. 

Ball, Timothy H., The Lake of the Red Cedars, Thirty Years in Lake 
County. Oi'own Point, 1880. 

Bankers'" Magazine. Nevp York, 1846, to . 

Banta, D. D., "Early Schools of Indiana," in Indiana Magazine of His- 
tory. II, 41, 81. 

Benson, Elbert J., The Wabash Trade Route in the Development of the 
Old Northioest, Johns Hopkins University Studies. Baltimore. 
1903. 

Benton, Thomas H., Thirty Yea7-s' View 1820-1850. Taken from Con- 
gressional Debates and Private Papers of Senator Benton. New 
York, 1856. 



I- 



492 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Bishop, Robeet H., An Outline History of the Presbyterian Church in 

Kentucky, containing the Memoirs of Rev. David Rice. Lexington, 

1824. 
Blanchard, IliiFus. The Discovery and Conquest of the Northwest. 

Chicago, 1880. This old book has never been so highly appreci- 
ated as it deserved. 
Bolton, Nathaniel, Early History of Indianapolis and Central Indiana, 

Pub. of Ind. Hist. Society, I, No. 5. 
Boone, R. G., History of Education in Indiana. 
Boyd, Carl Evans, "The Clarksville Conventions, 1785, 1787." Documents 

printetl in American Historical Review, II, 691. 
BouqueVs Expedition Against the Ohio Indians, Cincinnati, 1868. 
Bbackeneidge, H. M., History of the Late War Between the United 

States and Great Britain. Philadelphia, 1836. 
Beige, Wallace, History of Fort Wayne. Fort Wayne, 1868. 
Beown. Ignatius, Indianapolis Directory, 1868-9. Indianapolis, 1868. 

The Introduction contains a valuable History of Indianapolis. 
BuENET, Jacob, Islotes on the Early Settlement of the ^Northwestern 

Territory. Cincinnati, 1847. Valuable. 
BuTLEE, Mann, History of Kentucky. Louisville, 1834. 
BuTTEEFiELD, CONSUL W., Histovy of the G-irtys. Cleveland, 1898. This 

is a scholarly work and the most reliable on the Indian Wars of 

the period. 

Caeteb, Clabence E., Great Britain and the Illinois Country. Washing- 
ton, 1910. 

Catteeall, Ralph. The Second Bank of the Vmted States. Chicago, 
1903. 

Census Reports of the U. S. These are taken every decade and furnish 
the historian a vast amount of data. 

Charter of the State Bank of Indiana and the By-Laws of the Di- 
rectors. Indianapolis, 1841. 

Chase, S. P. (ed.) Statutes of Ohio and the Northwestern Territory, 
1833. The introduction contains much valuable History concern- 
ing the Northwest Territory. 

Clark, George Rogers, Papers, edited by James A. James, 1912. These 
are the best source for the conquest of the Northwest. 

Clark, Geace Julian, "George W. Julian, Some Impressions," in In- 
diana Magazine of History, II, 57. 

Claek, M. St. Clair, and Hall, D. A., Legislative and Documentary His- 
tory of the Bank of the United States, including the Bank of 
North America. Washington, 1832. 

Cleland, P. S., A Quarter Century Discourse delivered at Greenicood, 
1804. Indianapolis, 1865. 

Cleland, Rev. Thomas H., Memoirs of Thomas Cleland, D. D. Cincin- 
nati, 1859. 

CocKEUM, Col. William, Pioneer History of Indiana. Oakland City, 
Ind., 1907. An excellent book containing many documents of 
great value. 

Coffin, Levi, Reminiscences. Cincinnati, 1880. 

Coleman, C. B., "Some Religious Developments in Indiana," in Indiana 
Magazine of History, V, 57. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 493 

Coleman, Robeet E., "Simon Kenton," in Harper's Magazine, XXVIII, 

289. 
CoMSTOCK, Howard Payne, "History of Canals in Indiana," in Indiana 

Magazine of History, VII, 1. 
Congress, Annals of. 42 vols. Washington, 1834-1856. 
Congressional Debates. 29 vols. Washington, 1S25-1S37. 
Congressional Globe. 108 vols. Washington, 1834-1873. 
CoNANT, Charles A., A History of Moder-n Banks of Issue. Fourth 

Edition. New York, 1909. This has a chapter on State Banks. 
CooLEY, T. M., State Bank Issues in Michigan. In the publications of 

the Michigan Political Science Association. Ann Arbor. 
Cottman, George S., "Internal Improvements in Indiana," in Indiana 

Magazine of History, III, 101, 117, 148. 
Cottman, George S., "William H. Churchman and the School for the 

Blind," in Indiana Magazine of History, X, 77. 
Cottman, George S., "The Wabash and Its Valley," in Indiana Magazine 

of History, I, 59, 123 ; "Early Commerce in Indiana," in IV, 1. 
County Histories. For a list of these see Indiana Magazine of History, 

VI, 43. They are extremely valuable for State History, but, of 

course, must be used with care. 
Court Records. Use has been made of the records of the county courts 

at Vincennes and of the Supreme Court at Indianapolis. These 

records go back to 1790. No doubt additional information on 

the history of the state could have been had from other counties. 

Too little use is being made of this source of history. 
Cox, Sanford, Recollections of an Old Settler. Lafayette, 1860. A 

valuable memoir. 
Ceaig, Oscar J., Ouiatanon, lud. Hist. Soc. Publications II. No. 8. 
Ceoghan, George, Letters and Journals Relating to Tours into the 

Western Country, 1750-1765, in Early Western Travels, I, 53. 
Cross, Percy, Guerrilla Leaders of the World. 
CuLLEY, D. v., in Lawrenceburg Palladium, May 15, 1830, has a good 

accoimt of the Lochry Massacre. 
Cuming, Fortesque, Sketch of a Tour to the Western Country, 1807- 

1809, in Early Westo'n Travels, IV. 1. 
Cutler, Manasseh, Life, Journal and Correspondence of, edited by 

W. P. and J. P. Cutler. Cincinnati, 1888. 

Dawson, Moses, Life of Harrison. Cincinnati, 1834. This is the best 
biography of Harrison and contains much important documentary 
material. It was prepared under the direction of Harrison him- 
self. 

De Bow's Review. A Southern and Western Business Directory, 1845- 
1868. New Orleans. 

Dickey, John M., Brief History of the Presbyterian Church in the 
State of Indiana, Madison, 1828. The author was the "father" 
of the church in Indiana. 

DiLLENBAUGH, Feederick S., Breaking the Wilderness. New York, 1905. 
A good general discussion of pioneering. 

Dillon, Jno. B., History of Indiana to 1816, Indianapolis, 1859. The 
period from 1816 to 1859 is covered in twelve pages. It is scholarly 
and accurate. A short sighted legislature preventing him finishing 
his work and also fi'om giving us a state library to be proud of. 



494 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Dillon, Jno B., The National Decline of the Miami Indians, Ind. Hist. 
Soc. Publications, I, No. 4. 

Documents Relatiny to the Colonial History of 'New York, State Publi- 
cations. 

DoDD. W. F., The Revision and Amendment of State Constitutions, Balti- 
more, 1910. 

Donaldson, Thomas, The Public Domain, Washington. Documentary. 

Drake, Samuel G., Life of Teeumseh. 

DuDEN, Margaret, "Internal Improvements in Indiana, 1818-1846," in 
Indiana Magazine of History, V, 160. 

Duncan, H. C, "Austin Seward" (a pioneer of Monroe county), in 
Indiana Magazine of History, IV, 103. 

Dunn, J. P., Jr.,, Indiana, A Redemption from Slavery. Boston, 1888. 

Dunn. Jacob P., Jr., French Settlements on the Wabash, Ind. Hist. 
Soc. Publications, II, No. 11. 

Dunn. Jacob P., Jr.. The Mission to the Wabash, Ind. Hist. Soc. Publi- 
cations, III, No. 4. 

Dunn, Jacob P., Jr.. True Indian Stories. Indianapolis, 1908. 

Edson, Hanford a.. Contributions to the Early History of the Presby- 
terian Church in Indiana, Indianapolis, 1898. Accurate and full 
of details. 

English, William H., The Conquest of the Country Northwest of the 
River Ohio, Indianapolis, 1896. This is the fullest and best ac- 
count of Clark's Campaign. 

Esaret, Logan, Internal Improvements in Early Indiana, Ind. Hist. 
Soc. Publications, V, No. 2, 1912. 

Esarey, Logan, State BanMng in Early Indiana, Indiana University 
Studies. Bloomington, 1912. 

Esarey, Logan, "Vincennes' First City Government," in Indiana Maga- 
zine of History, V, 1 ; documentary. 

Evans. Madison, Biographical Sketches of the Pioneer Preachers of 
Indiana, Philadelphia, 1862. Contains a good sketch of the 
Northwestern Christian University. 

Executive Journal of Indiana Territory, edited by W. W. Woollen, 
Daniel Waite Howe and J. P. Dunn, Jr., Ind. Hist. Soc. Publi- 
cations, II, No. 3. 

Faux, W., Journal of a Tour Through the United States, 1823. He 
crossed southern Indiana, visiting, especially, Vincennes, Prince- 
ton and New Harmony. 

Fergus Historical Series. No. 34, contains the Papers of Philip de 
Rocheblave, who was captured at Kaskaskia. No. 35 contains 
the Record Book and Papers of John Todd. 

Ferris, Dr. Ezra, The Early Settlement of the Miami Country, Ind. 
Hist. Soc. Publications, I, No. 9. 

Finley, J. B., Life Among the Indians. 

"Fletcher Papers," Early Indianapolis, in Indiana Magazine of History, 
II, 29. 73. 127, 187, also in Indianapolis News, 1879. 

Flint, James, Letters from America, 1818-1820, in Early Western 
Travels, IX, I. Flint spent some weeks at Jeffersouville. 

FoRDHAM, Elias, Pym, Personal Narrative of Travels in Virginia and 
the West, edited by F. A. Ogg. Cleveland, 1905. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 495 

Gallatin, Albert, Writings. 3 vols. Philadelphia, 1879, vol. Ill, is of 

especial imix)i'tance. 
Gaenett, Chables Huntee, State Banks of Issue in Illinois, University 

of Illinois, 1898. 
Gazetteer of Indiana, 1833. Indianapolis. Small voliune of statistical 

and descriptive information. 
Gazetteer of Indiana, 1849, third edition. Indianapolis. Edited by E. 

M. Chamberlain. 
Gentleman's Magazine. An English contemporary magazine. 
Goodrich and Tttttle, A History of the State of Indiana, 1875. Of 

slight value. 
Goodwin, Frank P., ''Rise of Manufactures in the Miami Country," in 

American Historical Review, XII, 761. 
Griffith, Appleton Prentiss Clark, A Bibliography of the First and 

Second Banks of the United States, Washington, 1908. 
Gouge, William M., Short History of Paper Money and Banking in the 

United States. Philadelphia, 1833. This is a good contemporary 

discussion of the principles and practice of banking. 

Hall, Baynard R., The New Purchase. New York, 1843. 2 vols. A 
second edition was published in one volume at New Albany, 1855. 
This is a good literary picture of pioneer times in Indiana. 

Hall, James, Sketches of History, Life and Manners in the West, Cin- 
cinnati, 1834. 3 vols. 

Haldiman Papers in the Canadian Archives at Ottawa. These contain 
the British Official Papers concerning the Revolutionary War in 
the West. 

Haeding, William F., "The State Bank of Indiana, 1834 to 1859" ; in the 
Journal of Political Economy, December, 1895, University of Chi- 
cago. This is an excellent study of the bank from an economic 
standpoint. 

Harrison, William Henry, Aborigines of the Ohio Valley. 

Hawoeth, Paul L., "Folk Speech in Indiana," in Indiana Magazine of 
History, I, 163. 

Heitman, Francis Bernard, Historical Register of the Officers of the 
Continental Army. Washington, 1903. 

Hen/ing's Statutes of Virginia, These contain the laws of Virginia that 
pertain to Illinois county. 

Henry, William Wirt, Life Correspondence and Speeches of Patrick 
Henry, New York, 1891. Contains correspondence between CW. 
Clark and Gov. Henry. 

Henry, W. E., State Platforms of the Two Dominant Political Parties 
of Indiana, 1850-1900. Indianapolis, 1902. 

Hildreth, S. p.. Pioneer History, etc. Cincinnati, 1848. 

Historical Atlas of Indiana, illustrated. Baskin, Forster & Co., 1876. 
A very superior work, accurate and reliable. 

History of the Late War by an American, Baltimore, 1816. A fairly 
good account of the War of 1812 by an eyewitness of many of its 
events. Pro-American. 

Holliday, F. C, Indiana Methodism, Cincinnati, 1873. Contains good 
accounts of the Methodist colleges. 

Holliday, Rev. F. C, Life and Times of the Rev. Allen C. Wiley, 1853. 



496 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

HoLLowAY, W. R., Indianapolis; A Historical and Statistical Sketch of 

the Railroad City, Indianapolis, 1870. 
HovEY, Horace C, "The Origin of tlie Presbyterian Cliurcli in New 

Albany," in New Albany Ledger, Nov. 25, 1867. 
Howard, George E., An Introduction to the Local Constitutional History 

of the United States, Baltimore, 1889. This has a reputation un- 
warranted by its accuracy. 
Howe, Daniel Waite, The Laios and Courts of Northwest and Indiana 

Territories, Ind. Hist. Soc. Publications, II, No. 1. 
HuLBERT, Abcheb Butler, Historic HighiDuys, vol 8. Contains sketches 

of Clark's, St. Clair's and Wayne's routes, Cleveland, 1904. 
Humphrey, Edward P., and Cleland, Thomas H., Memoirs of the Rev. 

Thomas Cleland, compiled from his private papers, Cincinnati, 

1859. 
Hunt's Merchants Magazine, 1839 to 1860. New York. 

Indiana Alumni Quarterly, edited by Dr. S. B. Harding. Bloomington, 
1913. 

Indiana Magazine of History. Indianapolis and Bloomington, 1905. 

Indiana State Publications, Official Reports. No attempt has been made 
to make a bibliography of these. Taken as a whole they form the 
most valuable source of State History. At present they are not 
easily accessible to students or writers of history. As indicated 
by footnotes, they have been used continuously by the writer. 
They need to be published in order, and indexed, before they 
can be used to advantage. 

Jesuit Relations, edited by R. G. Thwaites, in 73 volumes. Cleveland, 

1896. 
Johnson, James H., A Ministry of Forty Years in Indiana. Indianapolis, 

1865. 

Kaskaskia Records, Illinois Hist. Collections, V. 

Kemper, Dr. G. W. H., A Medical History of Indiana, Chicago, 1911. 
Ketcham, John, Reminiscenees of Early Life About Vallonia, 1812, 
Bloomington, 1865. Read at his funeral. 

Lanier, J. F. D., Sketch of the Life of J. F. D. Lanier. New York, 
1874. The author was president of the Madison Branch Bank. 
He gives us an insight into the policy of the bank, by one who 
stood high in its councils. 

Lasselle, Charles B., "The Old Indian Traders of Indiana," in In- 
diana Magazine of History, II, 1. 

Law, John, The Colonial History of Vincennes, etc. Vinceunes, 1858. 

Laws. Under this title are included (1) The Laws of the Northwest 
Territory from 1788 to 1800; (2) The Laws of the Governor and 
Judges of Indiana Territory from 1800 to 1805; (3) The Laws 
of Indiana Territory from 1805 to 1815; (4) The Laws of Indiana 
to date. These were printed for the State by the different public 
printers. Complete sets can be found in the Law Library at In- 
dianapolis. The investigator must exercise both patience and 
discretion in their use. The names, dates and indexes are in- 
accurate, and one who relies upon them will be misled. lu many 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 497 

cases local and general laws are printed separately, no fixed rule 
being followed in the division. 

Lazenby, John C, "Jackson County Prior to 1850," in Indiana Maga- 
zine of History, X, 256. 

Legislative Records. Under this title are included three series of volumes : 
(1) The Journal of the House of Representatives; (2) The Jour- 
nal of the Senate; (3) The Documentai-y Journal. These were 
printed for the State by the public printer. Complete sets are 
to be found in the State Library at Indianapolis. Of the first two 
there is usually one volume each for each session of the Legisla- 
ture. The third begins with 1836 and there is usually one volume 
for each year. The same caution must be used with these as 
was suggested in the use of the Laws. The dates on the back, 
the numbers, the pagination and the indexes are unreliable. The 
only way to be sure a thing is not in one of these volumes is to 
look it through. The House and Senate Journals contain the 
minutes of the sessions of those bodies, but beyond that no fixed 
rule of publication has been followed. The substance of a speech 
is sometimes given, and many valuable committee reports are in- 
cluded. The Journals usually contain the Governor's message, 
and until the beginning of the Documentary Journal, in 1886, they 
contain all the reports from the State officers that were made to 
the Legislature. The Documentary Journal contains the committee 
reports, the official reports, the reports of special investigation, and 
other valuable papers. In this Journal are found the annual re- 
ports of the banks as well as many special reports called for 
from time to time by the Legislature. The long and detailed 
report on the bank by Nathan Palmer, in 1842, and the report 
of the Senate committee that investigated the "Bank Frauds," 
in 1857, are in this Journal also. Taken as a whole, the volmnes 
contain a vast amount of historical material. 

Leonard, Adam Ahi, Personal Politics in Indiana, 1816 to 1840. MSS. 

Leveeing, Julia Henderson, Historic Indiana, New York, 1909. 

LocKwooD, George B., The New Harmony Movement. New York, 1905. 

Lossing, Benson J., Pictorial Field Book of the War of 1812. New 
York, 1869. Excellent. 

Lossing, Benson J., "Scenes in the War of 1812." A series of articles 
in Harper's Magazine, vols. XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII. 

Lyon & Bartlett, LaSalle in the Valley of the St. Joseph, South Bend, 
1899. 

Mallet, Edward, Sieur de Vincennes, the Founder of Indiana's Oldest 
Town, Indiana Hist. Soc. Publications, III, 2. 

Manuscript copies of letters written by Nathaniel Ewing and others 
of the Vincennes Bank to Secretary Crawford are in the ofiice 
of the Clerk of the Circuit Court of Crawford county, Illinois. 
Printed copies of these letters may be found in American State 
Papers, Finance, vols. IV and V. 

Marshall, Humphrey, History of Kentucky. Louis^alle, 1812. 

Martindale, Charles, Loughery's Defeat and the Pigeon Roost Massa- 
cre, Ind. Hist. Soc. Publications, II, No. 1. 



498 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

Mathes, Rev. J as. M., Life of Elijah Goodwin. St. Louis, 1880. Ex- 
cellent. 
Mathes, Rev. J. M., Tlie Christian Record, 1S43-1S5S. Bloomiugton. 
Maximilian, Prince of Weid, Travels in the Interior of Noi'th America, 

in Early Western Travels, vols. XII, XIII, XIV. He was on the 

lower Wabash and Ohio. 
McCarer, AV. H., Remembrance of Past Days. Evansville, 1860. 
McOarty, Carlos T., "Hindostan, a Pioneer Town," in Indiana Magazine 

of History, X, No. 2. 
McCoy, Isaac, History of Bo/ptist Indian Missions. Washington, 1840. 

This is autobiographical and valuable on the condition of Indiana 

Indians from 1815 to 1830. 
McClung, John Alexander, Sketches of Western Adventures, etc., edited 

by H. Waller, Covington, 1872. 
McCtTLLOCH, Hugh, Men and Measures of Half a Century. New York, 

1889. The author was cashier of the Fort Wayne Branch of the 

State Bank, and President of the Bank of the State of Indiana. 

No one understood the banking business before the Civil War 

better than he. 
McDonald. Daniel, Address in House of Representatives, Indianapolis, 

February 3, 1905, on bill to erect a monument to Pottawattomie 

Indians at Twin Lakes, Marshall county. Pub. by direction of 

House of Representatives. 
McDonald, Daniel, Removal of the Pottawattomie Indians from North- 
ern Indiana. Plymouth, 1899. 
McDonald, Daniel, A History of Freemasonry in Indiana. Indianapolis, 

1898. 
McMaster, John Bach, A History of the People of the United States. 

New York, 1896. 
MiCHATJX, F. A., Travels to the West of the Alleghany Mountains in 

1802, in Early Western Travels, III, 110. 
MiCHAux, Andre, Journal, 1793-1796, Down the Ohio in Early Western 

Travels, III, 1. 
Michigan Historical and Pioneer Collections, 38 vols. Lansing. 
{_,, Miller, Marguerite, Home Folks, Stories of Old Settlers of Fulton 

County, 2 vols. Rochester. 
Mitchell, Prof. Waldo F., "Indiana's Growth, 1812-1820," in Indiana 

Magazine of History, X, 369. 
Morgan, Lewis H., League of the Iroquois. New York, 1904. 
Moore, Charles, The Northwest Under Three Flags. New York, 1900. 

A good, brief account of the early history of the Old Northwest. 
Moore, A. Y., History of Hanover College. Indianapolis, 1900. 
Morris, Bethuel F., Review of Ten Years' Service With Main Street 

Presbyterian Church at Rising Sun, 1844 to 1854. 

National Monetary Commission Publications. The following have been 
especially valuable : Dewey, Davis R.. State Banking Before the 
Civil War, and Holdworth, John Thom., The First and Second 
United States Bank. 
. Naylor, Judge Isaac, "The Battle of Tippecanoe," in Indiana Magazine 
of History, II, 163. 
Niles' Weekly Register, 73 vols, Baltimore, 1811-1848, 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 499 

Newspapers. A large part of the history of Indiana must of necessity 
be written from Newspaper sources. When it is possible to use 
several files covering the same period it is relatively easy by com- 
paring to ascertain the facts. Many files have been used con- 
tinually but the following are mentioned as most important for 
this period: 

Vincennes Western Sun, 1807 to the present. 

Indianapolis Journal, 1825 to 19(M. 

IndianaiK)lis Democrat and Sentinel, 1823 to 1904. 

Madison Courier, 1837 to present. 

Logansi5ort Pharos and the Logansport Telegraph. 

Lawrenceburg Palladium and the Vincennes Centinel. 
Usually references have been made to a single file but it is not 
difficult to find any current event in a newspaper file if the date 
is kept in mind. 
NowLAND, J. H. B., Early Reminiscences of Indianapolis, 1870, and 
Prominent Men of Indianapolis, 1877. 

Oglesbee, Rolla B., History of Michigan City. 

Pabkee, Benjamin S., "Pioneer Lrife," in Indiana Magazine of History, 

III, 1, 51, 125, 182. 
Pabkman, Francis, The Jesuits in America, Boston, 1897; LaSalle and 

the Discovery of the Great West, Boston, 1897 ; The Conspiracy of 

Pontiac, 2 vols., Boston, 1897. 
Parsons, Samuel Holden, Life and Letters of, edited by C. S. Hall. 

Binghamton, 1904. Parsons was one of the first judges of the 

Northwest Territory and lost his life by drowning while on circuit. 
Perkins and Peck, Annals of the West (Same as Albach's). 
Pershing, M. W., Life of General John Tipton and Early Indiana 

History, Tipton. 
Pirtle, Capt. Alfred, Battle of Tippecanoe, Filson Club Papers, No. 15, 

Louisville, 1900. 
PiBTLE, Henry, Clark's Campaign in the Illinois. Cincinnati, 1864. 

Documentary. 
Pitkin, Timothy, A Statistical Account of the Com/merce of the United 

States. New Haven, 1835. 
PiTTMAN, Capt. Philip, Present State of Settlements on the Mississippi, 

edited by Frank H. Hodder. Cleveland, 1906. 
PoLKE, James, "Memoirs," in Indiana Magazine of History, X, 83. 
PooRE, Ben Perley, Constitutions of the United States and the States, 

Washington, 1878. 
Post, M. M., A Retrospect After Thirty Years' Ministry at Logansport, 

1860. 
Potter, Rev. L. D., "Early History of Presbyterianism in the White- 
water Valley," in the Indiana Magazine of History, V, 28. 

QuAiFE, MiLO, Chicago and the Old Northwest. 

Rawles, W. a.. Centralizing Tendencies in the Administration of In- 
diana, New York, 1903. A most scolarly and valuable work. 



500 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

•» 

Reed, Rev. Isaac, The Christian Traveler, in five parts, including 
Nine Years and Eighteen Thousand Miles. New York, 1828. Reed 
was one of the first preachers in the Xew Purchase. 

Reed, Rev. Isaac, Youth's Book. Indianapolis, 1840. Family gossip 
about homelife in the New Purchase. 

Reid, Nina K., "James Noble," "Waller Taylor." "John Tipton" and 
"William Hendricks," in Indiana Magazine of History, IX. 

Report of the Committee on Banking. House Reports, 22d Congress, first 
Session, April, 1832. 

Report of the Debates of the Convention for the Revision of the Con- 
stitution of Indiana. H. Fowler, official reporter, Indianapolis. 
1850. 

Reports. In addition to the printed reports found in the Legislative 
Journals, many of the original manuscript reports, by State 
officials, are on file in the State Library. They include many 
details not contained in the printed form. They have been used 
in checking up the printed reports but no reference has been 
made to them in the notes. 

Robertson, Robert S.. Valley of the Upper Maumee. 2 vols. Madison, 
1889. 

Roosevelt, Theodore, The Winning of the West. New York, 1889. This 
is a very readable popular account and fairly accurate. 

Sabine, Lorenzo, Loyalists of the American Revolution. Boston, 1874. 

Safford, William H., The Blennerhassett Papers. Cincinnati, 1861. 

Sargent, Winthrop, Diary, etc., 1793. 

Schoolcraft, Henry R., The Indian Tribes of the United States. 
(^^Searight, Thomas B., The Old Pike, a History of the National Road. 
Washington, 1894. 

Secret Journals of Congress. These give the transactions with the 
Indians and Spaniards in the West during the Revolution. 

Shea, John Gilmary, Life of Archbishop Carroll. Gives some data con- 
cerning the early history of Vincennes. 

Shea, John Gilmary, Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi. 

Shockley, Dr. E. V., "County Seats and County Seats Wars," in Indi- 
ana Magazine of History. X. 1. 
/ ^,^Siebert, W. H., "Light on the Underground Railroad," in the American 
^ Historical Review, I, 456; also published separately. New York, 

1898. 

Slocum, Charles E., The Ohio Country, 1783-1815. New York, 1910. 
Deals largely with the Indian wars. 

Slocum, Charles E., History of the Maumee River Basin, Indianapolis, 
1905. 

Smith, Oliver H., Trials and Sketches. Cincinnati, 1858. Senator Smith 
was personally acquainted with most of the public men of the 
period, and his gossipy sketches give the reader a personal ac- 
quaintance with them. 

Smith, Rev. J. C, Reminiscences of Early Methodism in Indiana, In- 
dianapolis, 1879. 

Smith, John L., Indiana Methodism, Valparaiso, 1892. An interesting, 
gossipy volume. Excellent for the life of the period. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 501 

Smith, Theodore Clabke, The Liberty and Free Soil Parties in the 

Northwest, Harvard Historical Studies, vol. 4, New York, 1907. 
Smith, William Heney, History of the State of Indiana from the 

Earliest Explorations to the Present Time. Indianapolis, 1897, 2 

vols. Has some good material but on the whole is not reliable. 
Spaulding, M. J., Sketches of the Early Catholic Missions of Kentucky, 

etc., 1787 to 1826. Louisville. 
Spaeks, Jared, Life of Anthony Wayne. New York, 1872. 
Statutes at Large of Chreat Britain. These contain the English laws 

that pertain to the government of the Illinois country. 
St. Clair Papers, edited by William Henry Smith. Cincinnati, 1882. 

This is an invaluable source on the Northwest Ten-itory, 1788 to 

1800. 
Stewart, De. James H., Recollections of the Early Settlement of the 

Waiash Valley and Carroll County. Cincinnati, 1873. Excellent. 
Stickey, Ida Stearns, Civil Studies of Indianapolis. Early history of 

the city. 
Stott, Dr. Wm. T., Indiana Baptist History, 1908. This book has not 

circulated as widely as it should. 
Strickland, W. P., AutoMography of Peter Cartwright, the Backwoods 

Preacher. New York, 1856. 
Strickland, W. P., Pioneers of the West, New York. 
Strickland, W. P., Sketches of Western Methodism, New York, 1856. 
Sulgrove, B. R., History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Phila- 
delphia, 1884. 
Sweet, Prof. W. W., "Early Methodist Circuits in Indiana," in Indiana 

Magazine of History, X, 359. 

Thomas, John Hardin, "The Academies of Indiana," in Indiana Maga- 
zine of History, X, 331. 

Thompson, Col. R. W., Fallen Heroes of Methodism. 

Thorpe, Francis N., Constitutions and Charters, a new edition of 
Poore's Charters, etc. Washington, 1909. 

Thwaites, Reuben Gold, editor, Jesuit Relations. 

Thwaites, R. G., Early Western Travels, a series of reprints, 1748-1846, 
Cleveland, 1904. 
^ Thwaites and Kellogg, Revolution on the Upper Ohio. 

Thwaites, R. G., Chronicles of Border Warfare, Cincinnati, 1895. This 
was written by Alexander Scott Withers. 

Tipton, John, "Journal," in Indiana Magazine of History, I, 9, 74, II, 170. 

Todd, C. S., Civil and Military Services of W. H. Harrison, Cincinnati, 
1874. 

Trafton, Rev. Mark, Scenes of My Life, 1878. 

Treat, Payson J., The National Land System, 1785-1820. New York, 
1910. 

Trusty, Henry Clay, "Formation of the Christian Church in Indiana," 
in Indiana Magazine of History, VI, 17. 

'Tucker, George, The Theory of Money and Banking Investigated, Bos- 
ton, 1839. 

Turner, F. J., "Colonization of the West," in American Historical Re- 
view, XI, 303. 

(33) 



502 HISTORY OF INDIANA 

TuBNEE, F. J., "Tlie Policy of France Toward the Mississippi Valley in 
the Administrations of Washington and Adams," in American 
Historical Revieio, X, 249-280. 

United States Statutes at Large, Boston, 1848, vol. VII, contains the 
Indian Treaties from 1789 to 1845. 

VOGEL, William, "Home Life in Early Indiana," in Indiana Magazine 

of History, X. 
VoLNEY, CbNSTANTiNE Feancois, View of the CUmate and Soil of the 

United States, London, 1804. 

Wallace, Gen. Lew, An Autobiography, New York, 2 vols. 

Washington's Works, edited by Paul Leicester Ford, contains the cor- 
respondence with Clark concerning the attempt on Detroit. 

Webstee, Homeb J., William Henry Harrison's Administration of In- 
diana Territory, Indiana Hist. Soc. Publications, IV, No. 3^ 

White, Hoeace, Money and Banking Illustrated by American History, 
Boston and London, 1902. 

Williams, Jesse L., "Population and Productions of Indiana in 1840," in 
Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, IV, 473. The author was a United 
States marshal at the time. 

Wiluams, Lobing a., Publication of Old Settlers and Historical As- 
sociation of Lake County, Crown Point. 

Williams, Jesse L., Historical Sketch of the First Presbyterian Chur&h 
of Fort Wayne. Fort Wayne, 1881. 

WiNSOE, Justin, From Cartier to Frontenac, Boston, 1894. 

WiNSOE, Justin, 'Narrative and Critical History of America, 8 vols., 
Boston. 

WiNSOE, Justin, The Mississippi Basin, Boston, 1895. 

WooDBUEN, James A., Higher Education in Indiana, Washington, 1891. 

Weight, W. Swift, Pastime Sketches, consists largely of papers read 
before the Logansport Historical Society. 



INDEX 



Abbott, Lieut. Gov., commands Vin- 

cennes, 45. 
Agricultural Societies, early, 288. 
Aix la Cbapelle, Treaty of, 28. 
Allen, John, 239. 
Allouez, Claude, 3; at Green Bay, 

11. 
"American," steamer, 267. 
Andersontown, 183. 
Anderson, Baily, 206. ' 
Anderson, Captain, an Indian chief, 

231. 
Ange, St., governs Illinois, 40, 45. 
Anti-Gambling Society, 287. 
Anti-Masons, 306. 
Asbury University, 292. 
Ashworth, Moses, 281. 
Assenisipia, 128. 
Associations, Baptist, 282, 283. 
Astor, John Jacob, 384. 
Attica, founded, 240, 276. 
Aubbeenaubee, 334. 
Austin, Moses, 438. 

t 
Bad Axe, 331. 
■Badollet, John, 136, 342. 
Baen, W. C, killed, 189. 
Bailey, John, 55. 
Baird, Samuel, 137. 
Baird, Thomas D., 319. 
Ballard's Bluff, 360. 
Banks, free, 408; law for, 410; 

I)olicy, 410. 
Bank, First State, 233-236 ; branches, 

234; broke, 235. 
Bank, Second State, chartering, 394 ; 

five plans, 395 ; branches, 397 ; 

capital, 398; organization, 399; 

policy, 400; panic of, 1837, 403; 

suspended, 404; aids to war, 443. 
Bank of Indiana, Third State, 413; 

frauds in its charter, 414; 

branches, 415, 416. 
Bfiptist Church, early, 282-283. 
Barbour, Colonel, 196. 
Barnett, James, 275. 
Barron, Joseph, messenger, 184. 
Bartholomew, Joseph, woimded, 189; 

ranger, 200-201, 223. 



Bartholomew county, settled, 248. 

Bassett, Horace, 259. 

Battleground convention, 321. 

Beard, John, 319. 

Beaubois, Nicholas Ignace de, 19. 

Beckes, B. V., 331. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 431. 

Beers, P., stage owner, 261. 

Bees, wild, 424. 

Benack, 334. 

Bennett, William H., 319. 

Berry, Thomas, 189. 

Bible Society, American, 286. 

Biddle, Horace P., 456. 

Biddle, Nick, 307. 

Big Bottoms, Massacre at. 111. 

"Big Flat Woods," 241. 

Big Miami, 154. 

Bigger, James, ranger, 200. 

Bigger, Samuel, 319, 321, 322, 470. 

Biggs, William, 170. 

Birch Creek, 390 ; mob at, 391. 

Bird, Henry, Indian partisan, 48; 
leads an Indian army into Ken- 
tucky, 80. 

Birney, James G., 475. 

Bissell, Lieutenant, 331. 

"Bitters," 433. 

Blackbird, 191. 

Blackford, Isaac, 303. 

Black Hawk, 328, 329. 

Black Hawk's War, 325. 

Blair, James, 319. 

Blake, Thomas H., 223, 336. 

Blannerhassett, Herman, 178. 

Blind, asylum for, 436-437. 

Blockhouses, on the frontier, 190, 
198; in Daviess county, 207. 

"Bloody 300," 33L 

Bloomington, settled, 241. 

Blue Jacket, Shawnee chief, 106, 124. 

Blue Licks, 87. 

Blue River, 159. 

Blythe, B. I., 266. 

Bond, Shadrack, 169. 

Boone, Mose, 205. 

Boone, Ratliff, 206, 309. 

Boone, Squire, 205. 

Booneville, founded, 207. 



504 



INDEX 



Bosseron, Francis, 67, 97, 134. 

Botanic Physicians, 434. 

Bouquet, Henry, invades Indian 

country, 36. 
Bowles, W. A., 447. 
Bowman, Jolin, invades Indian 

country, 79. 
Bowman, Josepli, joins Clarli, 49; 

captures Caliokia, 55. 
Boyd, Jolin P., 186. 
Boyd's Fort, 210. 
Bradstreet, Jolm, invades Indian 

country, 35. 
Brady, Henry, 312. 
Brant, Joseph, 85. 
"British Band." 326. 
Bright, Michael G., 376, 385, 456. 
Broad Ripple, 370. 
Brodhead, Daniel, Commands at 

Pittsburg, 84. 
Brooks, James, 321. 
Brookville, 199; land office at, 343. 
Brouilette, Michael, 184. 
Brute, Gabriel. 279. 
Bryant's Station, 87. 
Buckingham. Ebenezer, 340. 
Buckongahelas, 124. 
Bueua Vista, battle at, 446. 
Bullitt's Lick, 108. 
Buntin, Robert. 136. 
Burks, James, 252. 
Burnet, Jacob, trip to Vincennes, 

143. 
Burnett, Governor of New York, 28. 
Burr conspiracy, 178-179. 
Burr, David, 357. 
Bush, George, 276. 
Busroe. Settlement. 280. 
Butler, Charles, 380. 
Butler, Ovid, 483. 

Butler, Richard, aid to St. Clair, 116. 
Butler, Richard, Indian Commis- 
sioner, 92, 93. 
Butler Bill, first, 382; second, 383. 

Cadillac, La Motte, 9. 
Caldwell, William, 86. 
Calomel doctors. 434. 
Camp Clark, 441, 443, 449. 
Campaign of 1844, 446 ; of 1852, 484. 
Campbell, Alexander, 286. 
Campbell, John B., 197-198, 
Campbell. Thomas, 206. 
Canal board, 357 note; 366. 
Canal, Ohio Falls, 236. 237. 
Canby, Israel, 308, 311, 349. 
Capital, removal of, 210. 



Captain Jonny, 124. 

Carr, John, 204, 305. 

Carlton, Sir Guy, policy in West, 
103. 

Carr, George W., 450, 479. 

Carr, Samuel, 316. 

Cartwright, Peter, 280, 281. 

Cass, Lewis, 202, 360, 473, 482. 

Catholic, 279, 280. 

Cedar Lake, 275. 

Celoron, Bienville de, 16 ; on Ohio, 
28. 

Celoron, Pierre Joseph, Indian par- 
tisan, 55. 

Census of 1810. 179, 180, 210; of 
1816. 215 ; of 1830, 277, note. 

Central Canal, 364, 369, 376. 

Chamberlain, E. M., 483. 485. 

Chambers, Benjamin. 170, 204. 

Chapman, Jacob Page, 456, 477. 

Charities, State, 435. 

Cherokees, 94. 

Chersonesus, 128. 

Chicago, 190, 191. 

Chickasaws, 20. 

Chipkawke, 22. 

Chippewas, 328. 

Christian Church, 285, 286. 

Christmas, 430. 

Churches, early. 279-287. 

Churchman, William H.. 436. 

Circuits, judicial, 141, 146; Metho- 
dist. 280, 281. 

Cincinnati, legislature at, 149. 

"Cincinnati," 444. 

Clark, George Rogers, 48-67; dual 
instructions, 49; at Louisville, 50; 
takes Kaskaskia, 51; captures 
Vincennes, 59-67 ; plans for cap- 
ture of Detroit, 78; builds Fort 
Jefferson, 80; expedition to Old 
Chillicothe. 81; last attempt on 
Detroit. 84 ; raids Miami towns, 
87. 93; ordered to Vincennes, 95; 
army mutinies, 96; grant confirm- 
ed, 127. 

Clark, Marston G., 239, 316. 

Clark, Othniel, 408. 

Clark, William, 167. 

Clark, William, a justice, 131. 

"Clark's Grant." 69; settler on, 94; 
203. 

Clark county, boundaries, 157, 159, 
203. 

Clarksville, 131, 203. 

Clay, Henry, 251; writes Anti-Ma- 
sons. 306, 314, 315; at Indian- 
apolis, 470. 



INDEX 



505 



Clay-Adams, Party, 300. 

"Classification," 367. 

Cleariug, 425. 

Clelaud, Thomas, 283. 

aeudenniu, John G., 316, 366. 

Clinton, laid out, 240. 

Clothing of pioneers, 423. 

Coe, Isaac, 287. 

Colfax, Schuyler, 456. 

"Collar" press. 315. 

Collings, William, 193. 

Colonization Society, Indiana, 287. 

Columbus, laid out, 243. 

Combs, Michael, 286. 

Commerce in 1810, 180 ; in 1830, 400 ; 
with New Orleans, 246. 

Committee of General Correspond- 
ence, 299. 

Common Pleas, 146. 

Commons, at Vincennes, law for, 150. 

Company of the Indies, owns Illi- 
nois, 22. 

Comparet, Samuel, 275. 

Conference, first Methodist, 280. 

Congressional Caucus, 296. 

Congressional elections, 310, 311. 

Connor, John, 184. 

Conolly, John, spy in Kentucky, 103. 

Constable, 147. 

Constitutional Convention, 1816, 
217-221; members, 218; work not 
ratified, 218; compared, 219; ana- 
lyzed, 220 ; put in operation, 222 ; 
first election under, 222. 

Constitutional Convention of 1850, 
450-461 ; organizing, 454 ; election 
of delegates to, 455; membership, 
456 ; politics of, 456 ; new features, 
457 ; ratification of, 460 ; cost, 461. 

Convention, Democratic, 306, 318, 
474, 488. 

Convention, Whig, 305, 306, 315, 471, 
484. 

Cook-stoves, 422; utensils. 423. 

Coquillard, Alexis, 275, 324. 

Corn, uses of, 427. 

Cornbread, 423. 

Corn shucking, 428. 

"Cornstalk" militia, 440, note. 

Corydon, founded, 206 ; becomes 
capital, 211 ; government at, 222- 
253. 

County, government of, 168, 225. 

Cbunty committee, 299. 

County officers, 147. 

Courreurs de bois, 9. 

Courts, county and township, 168, 
171. 



Covington, 276. 

Covington, S. F., 477. 

Cox, Sanford, 274. 

Coyle, Fitzhugh, 371. 

Cravens, James H., 485. 

Cravens, William, 281. 

Crawford, Josiah, 281. 

Crawford, William, defeated and 

killed, 86. 
Crawford county, settled, 208. 
Crawfordsville, land office at, 241, 

344. 
Creditors of State, 378. 
Oroghan, George, on the Ohio, 29; 

journey, 37-40; 186. 
Crooked Legs, Chief, 104. 
Cross Cut Canal, 370. 
Crowe, John Finley, 292. 
Crozat, Anthony, given grant, 22. 
Crume, Moses, 281. 
Cutler, Manasseh, 128. 



Dablon, 3. 

Dalton, Valentine, commands at Vin- 
cennes, 96, 97. 

Dancing, 431. 

D'Artiguiette, attacks Chickasaws, 
22. 

Daviess, Jos. H., 186; killed, 189. 

Daviess county, settled, 207. 

Davis, Jefferson, 447. 

Davis, John W., 324, 47a 477^ 479. 

Davis, Thomas Terry, 167. 

Deaf and Dumb Asylum, 436. 

Dearborn county, settled, 204. 

Debt, State, 376, table, 377. 

Decker, Luke, wounded, 189. 

De Forest, Joseph, 206. 

Defrees, John D., 415, 465, 485. 

Dela wares, 73 ; a band of, destroyed 
at Vincennes, 79; visited by 
Gamelin, 106, 200, 201; go west, 
229, 324. 

Delphi, settled, 274. 

Democratic factions, 477. 

Demoiselle, La, 29. 

Democratic party, on the conven- 
tion, 453 ; in campaign of 1844, 
473. 

Democratic Speakers, 1840, 319. 

Denis, M. de St., 20. 

De Peyster, Arent, carries on border 
war, 78, 80, 85, 87. 

Detroit, 9, 156, 157, 158. 

Dewey, Charles, 204. 

D'Iberville, 9. 

Dickey, John McElroy, 284. 



506 



INDEX 



Dill, James, 213. 

"Drag," 427. 

Drake, James P., 443, 445. 

Dress of pioneers. 424; fabrics, 424. 

Dreuillettes, Gabriel, 10. 

Driftwood, Indians on, 199-200. 

Dobson, D. M., 479. 

Door Village, 328, 329. 

Doughty, John, 101, 109. 

Douglas, John, 314. 

Douville, Ensign, at post Miamis, 

29. 
Dowling, Thomas, 485. 
Dubois, Touissant, 184. 
Dubuisson, Sieur, at Ouiatanon, 17, 

18. 
"Dugouts," 315. 
Dumont, Ebenezer, 401. 
Dumont, John, 252. 
Dunkards, 285. 
Dunlap, Livingston, 312. 
Dunn. George G., 319, 480, 488. 
Dunn, Isaac, 282. 
Dunn, Williamson, a ranger, 200, 

241, 343. 
Dunn, William M., 456. 
Dunning, Paris C, 477. 
Duvernay, Julian, last Jesuit at Vin- 

cennes, 30. 

"Eating Brigade," 366. 
Eaton, John, 264. 
Edeline, Louis, 134. 
Edmunds, J. W., 325. 
Education, pioneer, 289-296. 
Edwards, John, 319. 
Elections, 160, 161; first State, 222. 
Elliott, Chester, 258. 
Elliott, Jehu T., 415. 
Ellis, E. W. H., 411. 
Embree, Elisha. 485. 
Enabling Act, 213. 
English Forts, held after Revolu- 
tion, 89. 
Estil, William, 206. 
Etherington, George, captured, 32. 
Eugene, 276. 
Evans. Robert M., 207. 
Evansville, founded. 207, 239. 
Ewing, Alexander, 275. 
Ewing. G. W., 324. 
Ewing, John, 395. 
Ewing, Nathaniel, 136, 324. 
Ewing, W. G.. 324. 

"Facts for the People," 308. 
Fallen Timbers, Battle of, 124. 



Farmers and Mechanics' Bank, 234, 
394. 

Farming, pioneer, 425. 

Fayette county, settled, 209. 

Fence-Viewers, 148. 

Ferguson, John, 392. 

Ferris, Ezra, 282. 

Finley, J. B., 323, note. 

Finney, Walter, 93, 99. 

Fisher, George. 169. 

First State Bank, 297. 

"First Voters" rallies, 320. 

Five Medals, 194. 

Flaget, Bishop, 279. 

Flatboatiug, 269-272. 

Flatboats, 240. 

Flemming, William, 206. 

Floyd, Davis, 169, 179, 206. 

Floyd county, settled, 206. 

Fontleroy, R. H., 371, 386. 

Ford, Lemuel, 331. 

Ford, William, 442. 

Fort Chartres, built, 22; descrip- 
tion, 41. 

Fort Dearborn, surrendered, 191. 

Fort Finney, 94. 

Fort Gage (new name of Chartres), 
captured, 52. 

Fort Greenville, built, 122. 

Fort Harmar, treaty at, 99. 

Fort Harrison, built, 186, 193, 195, 
196, 201; celebration at, 483. 

Fort Jefferson, 117, 122. 

Fort Knox, built, 98; council called 
at, 103, 104, 108, 186, 189. 

Fort Mcintosh, 93. 

Fort Miamis, 6; captured, 33; Crog- 
han at, 39. 

Fort Recovery, built, 122 ; assaulted, 
122, 154. 

Fort Sackville, (Vincennes) cap- 
tured, 63. 

Fort St. Joseph, captured, 32, cap- 
tured and destroyed by Spanish, 
83. 

Fort St. Louis, 7; destroyed by Iro- 
quois, 8. 

Fort Steuben, 94, 95, 99, 103, 203. 

Fort Wayne, built, 124; treaty at, 
163; land cessions, 184. 190, 192, 
194; Indian school, 232; settled, 
275, 324 ; land office at, 344. 

Fourth of July, 430. 

Fox river, 327. 

Foyles. Mr., opens stage line, 261. 

Franklinton, 198. 

Franklin College, 292. 

Frazier, John, 370. 



INDEX 



507 



Fredonia, settled, 241. 

"Free Democracy," 485. 

Freeman, , sent among In- 
dians, killed, 120. 

Freeman's Corners, 340. 

Free Soil party, 1844, 474. 

Freight rates, 358. 

French, at Vincennes dissatisfied, 
173. 

French settlers, 22-27. 

Frontier life, 1812-15, 198. 

Fund Commissioners, 365, 373. 

Funk, Peter, 186. 

Furniture of pioneer home, 422. 

Fur trade, materials of, 26. 

Fur traders, 3, 23; list given, 25-26. 



Gage, General, proclamation, 45. 

Galissoniere, Marquis de la, gover- 
nor of Canada, 28. 

Gallatin, Albert, 342, 405. 

Game, 424. 

Gamelin, Pierre, agent to Indiana, 
104-108, 134. 

Games, pioneer social, 431. 

Gards. 204. 

Garland letter, 475. 

Geiger. Frederick, 186. 

Georgetown, 206. 

Georgetown Bar, 269. 

Gerald, 204. 

Germaine, Lord George, arms In- 
dians, 48. 

German vote, the, 1844, 475. 

Gibault, Pierre, assists Clark, 52 ; 
secures Vincennes, 53. 

Gibson, John, secretary, 155, 156; 
duties, 162, 199, 210. 

Gibson county, settled, 207. 

Girty, George, 85. 

Girty, Simon, Indian partisan, 48; 
in Kentucky, 80. 

Godfrey, a French partisan at Fort 
Miami, 33. 

Gooding, Lieut., wounded, 189. 

Goose-pulling, 431. 
•"Gore," 157, 159, 173, 340. 

Gorman, Willis A., 449. 

Gosix)rt, settled, 209. 

"Grace Darling," 444. 

Grand Glaize, 123. 

Grant county, 197. 

Grassy Valley, 205. 

Gravier, at mouth of Ohio, 15. 

Grays, 204. 

Great Lakes, 1. 

Greensburg, rally, 1840, 320. 



Greenville treaty, 124; second 

treaty, 202, 203. 
Griffin, 6. 
Griffin. John, 167. 
Grouseland, treaty of, 163. 
Grover, M. G., 328. 
Gwathmey, Samuel, 170. 

Hackleman, Pleasant, 465. 

Haddon, W. R., 447. 

Half-faced camp, 421. 

Hall, Samuel, 366. 

Hamilton, Allen, 324. 

Hamilton, Henry, at Detroit, 47 ; re- 
captures Vincennes, 56; surren- 
ders, 66. 

Hamilton, James, 204: \ 

Hamilton coimty, (Ohio) organized, 
131. 

Hamtramck, John F., 97, 101, 103; 
moves up Wabash, 110, 111; with 
St. Clair, 117; with Wayne, 124. 

Hand, Edward, commands Pittsburg, 
49. 

Handy, Henry S., 303. 

Hanna, Samuel, 259, 275, 324. 

Hannegan, Edward A., 304, 311, 335, 
469, 479, 483. 

Hanover College, 292. 

Hanover, convention at 306. 

"Hard Money" Democrats, 408. 

Hard times, 1819, 247. 

Hardin, John, commander of mili- 
tia, 108; defeated on Eel river, 
109; again at Fort Wayne, 110; 
with Scott, 113; killed, 120. 

Hardins, 204. 

Hardy, Thomas, 127. 

Hargrave, Hudson, 206. 

Hargrave, Richard, 281. 

Harmar, Josiah, commands in the 
west, 92, 91 ; ordered to Vincen- 
nes, 96, 101; attacks Indians, 109; 
defeated, 116. 

Harris, Horatio J., 380. 

Harrison, Christopher, 223 ; candi- 
date for governor, 250, 255. 

Harrison, Joseph, 157. 

Harrison, William Henry, on land 
cessions, 135; elected to Congress, 
1.50 ; in Congress, 151 ; governor, 
155; character, 161, 182, 183, 184; 
at Tippecanoe. 186-190; 194, 197, 
202, 312, 313, 314. 

Harrison county, settled, 205. 

Harrod, William, joins Clark, 49. 

Hart, John, 206. 

Harvest, 427. 



508 



INDEX 



Hawkins, Eli, 207. 

Hay, John, 170. 

Heath, Andrew, surveyor, 137. 

Heald, Nathan, 191. 

Helm, Leonard, joins Clark, 49. 

Hendricks, Thomas A., 456. 

Hendricks, William, elected to 

Congress. 222; governor, 250. 
Henry, Patrick, assists Clark, 48. 
Herriott, Samuel, 319. 
Heth. R. M., 206. 
Hickory creek, 327. 
Hinds, Thomas, 321. 
Historical Society, organized, 288. 
"Hob-nails," 472. 
Hog Island. 266. 
Holman, Jesse D., 223. 
Holman, Joseph, 275, 324, 344. 
Holman, W. S., 456. 
Holmes, Ensign, killed, 33. 
Home life, 421. 
Hoosier dialect, 419. 
Hoover. David, 358. 
Hopkins, Samuel, 195, 196. 
Horseshoe Plain, Clark crosses, 62. 
House, pioneer. 421. 
Hovey. Alvin P., 456. 
Howard, Tilghman A., 319, 469. 
Hull, William, surrenders, 191. 
Huron Indians, 3, destroyed, 72. 

Illinoia, 128. 

Illinois, cut ofE from Indiana, 158, 
210. 

Illinois Coimtiy, government under 
English, 28-47 ; under Virginia, 67. 

Illinois Land Company, 43. 

Immigration to Indiana, 244. 

Inflationists, 409. 

Indian Creek, 204. 

Indiana Territory, boundaries, 154 ; 
census of, 155; counties. 156; set 
off from Illinois, 158; raised to 
second grade. 159; legislature of, 
169-170; development of, 178-180; 
commerce, 180. 

Indiana, admission of, 215. 

Indiana College, 292. 

Indiana Freeman, a campaign paper, 
474. 

Indiana Sabbath school union, 286. 

Indiana University, 292. 

Indianapolis, site of, 237; the State 
capital, 238; name, 239; settled, 
244. 

Indianapolis Water Company. 376. 

Indians, visit Montreal, 3; of In- 
diana, 70-78 ; become wards of the 



nation, 89-91; their government, 
90; last struggle for Ohio river, 
92-125; 228-233; boundary line, 
228; schools, 230; drunkenness, 
231-232; treaty at Fort Harrison, 
229; at St. Mary's, 229; removal 
of, 323 seq. 

Internal Improvements party, 304, 
305, 462. 

Internal Improvements System, 352 
seq. ; lobby for, 363 ; Mammoth 
Bill, 363; construction of, 366; 
political results, 462, 464. 

Irish, 359. 

Iroquois, destroy Hurons, 3; attack 
Miamis, 12. 

Irvine, William, 86. 

Jackson. Andrew, loses vote of Wa- 
bash counties, 308. 

Jacksonian party, 296-304. 

Jala pa, 197. 

Jenkins, captured, 32. 

Jefferson, Thomas, 127 ; plans Jeffer- 
souville, 204. 

Jeffersonville, 203. 

Jennings, Jonathan, 198, 204, 211, 
213, 215; elected governor, 223, 
229; to Congress, 250, 324, 353. 

Jennings county, settled, 209. 

Jesuits plan an Indian Nation, 1. 

Jaunay, Pierre du, priest at Ouia- 
tanon, 30. 

John, Robert, 357. 

Johnson. James, 136, 261, 262. 

Johnson, John, 169; Indian agent, 
231. 

Johnson, Robert, 274. 

Johnson, R. M., 311. 312. 

Johnson, William Cost, plan of, 473. 

Johnson, Sir William, report on In- 
dians, 29. 

Johnson county, settled, 243. 

Joliet, sees Ohio river, 13. 

Jones, John Rice, 170. 

Jones, Peter, 213. 

Jucherau de St. Denis, at mouth of 
Ohio. 15. 

Judnh, Samuel, 304, 308, 311, 318, 
319, 357. 

Judges, territorial, their work, 140- 
142. 

Julian, George W., 486. 

Kankakee portage, 6. 13. 
Kaskaskia, capture of, 48. 
Kekionga, Indian town, 77; visited 
by Gamelin, 106. 



INDEX 



509 



Kelso, Daniel, 259, 456, 469. 
Kennedy, Andrew, 470. 
Kentuckians, hostile to the Indians, 

102; loyal, 103, 112. 
Kethtipecanunc, 114. 
Kickapoos, village, 104 ; hostile, 105 ; 

raided, 115; leave the State, 229. 
Kilgore, David, 456. 
Kiniberlin, John, 206. 
Knight, Jonathan, a surveyor, 256. 
Knox county organized, 137. 
Krouch, Jean, 120. 

La Balme, attempt on Detroit, 82; 
killed, 83. 

Lafayette, settled, 274; a port of 
entry, 307. 

Laffont, Jean, agent of Clark, 53. 

LaFollette, Robert, 206. 

Lagro, 276; riot at, 360. 

La Jeune, 2. 

Lake Indians, hostile, 105, 115. 

Lakin, Benjamin, 280. 

Lalumiere, Bishop, 280. 

Lamberville, Jean de, 11. 

Lamorinie, John Baptist, among the 
Miamis, 30. 

Lancaster, Morris, 319. 

Land claims, 132-137; by town of 
Vincennes, 132 ; by Illinois Land 
Company, 132 ; Wabash Land Com- 
pany, 132 ; rejected by Congress, 
133 ; by French settlers, 134 ; gifts 
by Congress. 135 ; to militia, 135. 

Land Companies, 42; Walpole, 43; 
Mississippi, 43 ; Illinois, 43 ; Wa- 
bash, 43, 

Land, low, 152; 153. 

Land, price, 345, 358. 

Land Offices, 160, 342; embezzle- 
ment at, 349-350; auctions at, 
349; land sold, tables, 350. 

Land Office at Crawfordsville, 273. 

Land sales, 344, 359. 

Lane, Daniel C, 223. 

Lane, James H., 448, 448, 485. 

Lane, H. S., 442, 471. 

Lane, Joseph, 447, 449. 

Lanier, J. F. D., 304, 394, 404, 405. 

L'Anguille, visited by Gamelin, 106; 
destroyed by Wilkinson, 115. 

La Plante, Pierre, 184. 

LaPorte land office, 344. 

La Salle, 3-8. 

Latshaw, Joseph, 264. 

"Lawrence," steamer, 267. 

Lawrenceburg, founded, 204. 

Leavenworth, founded, 208. 



Lee, Arthur, Indian Commissioner, 

92, 127. 
Legion, 122. 

Legislation, of first Assembly, 172. 
Legislative Council, first, 150. 
Legras, J. M. P., commandant at 

Vincennes, 67, 97, 134. 
Legris, Miami chief, 106, 124, 
Lexington, settled, 206. 
Liberty party, 480. 
Ligneris, Marchand de, commandant 

at Ouiatanon, 30. 
Lilly, William H., Auditor of State, 

223. 
Liquor Question, in 1839, 317, 466, 
Liquor traffic, 163, 164, 171, 181. 
Little Turtle, defeats La Balme, 83, 

122, 123, 124, 181, 182, 190, 191; 

home spared, 194, 195. 
Liverpool, 239. 
Lobelia, 434. 
Local legislation, 453. 
Lochry, Archibald, raises company 

for Clark, 84; ambushed and 

killed, 85. 
Lockport, 276. 
Loftis, Arthur, attempts to reach 

Illinois, 40. 
Logan, Benjamin, 81, 82, raid on 

Ohio Indians, 95. 
Logansport, settled, 274; site of In- 
dian agency, 324. 
Log-house, 422. 
Log-rolling, 425. 
Logstown, 28. 
Long, Elisha, 366, 
Lorain, a French trader, 33. 
Lord, Hugh, 133. 
Louis XIV, 9. 
Louisiana Purchase, under Indiana, 

157. 
Lucas, E. F., 385. 

Madison, founded, 200, 

Madison bank, 234. 

Madison railroad, 264, 376, 

Magic Bowl, 188. 

Mail service, early, 272, 273. 

Maisonirtle, a French trader, 33. 

Maiden, 183, 326. 

Mansfield, Jared, 340. 

Maria Creek, 209. 

Marietta, settled, 130. 

Marin, Sieur Laperriere, at St, 

Joseph, 29. 
Marpack, Indian chief, 190, 
Marquette, 3; death, 13. 
Marshall, Joseph G., 469, 471, 477. 



510 



INDEX 



Marshall, William, 326. 

Matchedash Bay, 3. 

"Matilda Barney," on the St. Jos- 
eph, 269. 

Matson, John A., 485. 

Mauck, Frederick, 206. 

Mauckport, 200. 

Maxwell, David H., 366, 371. 

Maxwell Code, 142, 146. 

Maysville, founded, 207. 

Madison, founded, 188. 

Menard, Pierre, 170. 

Menominee, 334. 

Mercer, John, 99. 

Merrill, Samuel, 401, 406. 

Methodist Churches, early, 280. 

Metociuiah Creek, 147. 

Metropotamia, 128. 

Meurin, Sebastian, at Vincennes, 30. 

Mexican War, 438; organizing 
troops for, 441 ; political effects, 
478. 

Mia mis, 10-12; return to Indiana, 
16; at St. Jaques, 17; their con- 
federacy, 71 ; description, 75 ; tra- 
ditions, 77; war, 104-125; visited 
by Gamelin, 106, 190, 323, 324, 
328, 332, 336. 

Mia mi sport, 276. 

Michigan, cut ofC from Indiana, 157, 
158. 

Michigan Road, 257-261. 

Michigania, 128. 

Michillimacinac, captured, 32. 

Militia, law, 164, 165; numbers, 180; 
paraded, at Vincennes, 186; in 
War of 1812, 198; in Mexican 
War, 439; arms of, 440. 

Miller, James, at Fort Harrison, 
187, 196. 

Milliken, J. P., 489. 

Mills. 428. 

Mills, John, 137. 

Milroy, Samuel, 308, 311, 349. 

Mingoes, 73. 

Mishawaka, iron foundry, 269. 
,v Missionaries, Hurons, 2. 

Mississinewa, battle, 196-198. 

Mississippi Company, given the Illi- 
nois Country, 22. 

Mississippi Land Company, 43. 

Mitchell, Dr. D. G., Anti-Mason 
candidate, 309. 

MofEatt, James T., 319. 

Monroe, James, 127 ; visits State, 
251. 

Monroe electors, 222. 

Monrovia, 386. 



Montezuma, 187. 

Montgomery, John, joins Clark, 50. 

Montgomeryville, 252. 

Moore, Asa, 355. 

Moore, Harbin, 303. 

Moore, T. P., 273. 

Moravian Towns, 86. 

Morris, Thomas, at Fort Miami, 35. 

Morrison, Alexander F., 312. 

Morrison, James, 312, 401, 469. 

Morrison, John I., 456. 

Morrisons, 204. 

Morrow, Jeremiah, 215. 

Munsees, 197. 

Murray, William, 132. 

Muster day, 166. 

Mt. Pleasant, settled, 209. 

McAfee, Robert B., 313. 

McCarty, A., stage owner, 261. 

McCarty, Jonathan, 305, 321. 

McCarty, Nicholas, 273, 324, 488. 

McClellan, Abraham, 259. 

McCoy, Captain, 113. 

McCoy, Isaac, missionary, 230. 

McCulloch, Hugh, 416. 

McDonald, John, 258. 

McFarland, William, 211. 

McGary, Hugh, 207. 

McGaughey, E. W., 476. 

McGrady, James, 283. 

McMahan, Richard, killed, 189. 

National Democrats, 305. 

National Road, 255. 

Navigation of Streams, 263-269. 

Naylor, Isaac, 321. 

Neely, John I., 258. 

New, Robert A., 178; secretary of 

State, 223. 
New Albany, founded, 206. 
Newberry, 390. 
New Castle, laid out, 244. 
New Coshocton, 93. 
Newell, Captain, 327, 329. 
New Harmony, 248. 
"New Light," 285. 
Newport, laid out, 240; bank at, 

412. 
New Orleans market, 173. 
New Purchase, 229, 239-248. 
New Year, 430. 
Niblack, John, 241. 
Niles, 232. 
Noble, James, elected Senator, 223, 

343. 
Noble, Lazarus, 343. 
Noble, Noah, 259, 266, 304, 309, 331, 

343, 363, 366, 369, 401. 



INDEX 



511 



Norris, Seton W., 312. 

Northwest Territory, in treaty of 
1783, 88 ; organization of, 126 ; ces- 
sion of by Virginia, 126; State 
names suggested, 128 ; government, 
130; first legislature, 130; under 
the judges, 138; civil government, 
142; second grade, 149; division 
of, 152. 

Note shaving, 347-348. 

Notre Dame du Lac, 293. 

Oatman's Ferry, 200. 

Occupations, pioneer, 424. 

Office holding clique, 160. 

Ohio river, discovered by La Salle, 5. 

Oliver, William, 192. 

Orchard, John, stage, 262. 

Ordinance of 1787, 129. 

Oregon, 439. 

Orleans, laid out, 241, 

Orr, General, 331. 

Orth, Godlove S., 477. 

Osborn, Andrevp L., 415. 

Ottawas, 328. 

Ouiatanon, stockade built, 17; not 

rebuilt, 18; captured, 32; Croghan 

at, 38; Indian council at, 94. 
Ouiatanons, return to Indiana, 16; 

home of, 77. 
Outrelay, Etienne de, wrote of Vin- 

cennes, 19. 
Outrelay, Pierre de, mentioned Vin- 

cennes, 19. 
Owens, Abraham, 186, 189. 
Owen, David, ranger, 200. 
Owen, Robert Dale, 456, 470, 479, 

483, 485. 
"Owl Creek" Currency, 395, 411. 

Pack horses, for Harmar's army, 

108. 
Palestine, settled, 241. 
Palmer. Nathan B., 309, 374, 469. 
Panic of 1837, 403. 
Paoli, settled, 241. 
Paper money, in Illinois, 68. 
"Paragon," runs to Logansport, 267. 
Parish's Grove, 327. 
Parke, Benjamin, 169; elected to 

Congress, 170; judge, 223, 288. 
Parke county, settled, 240. 
Parker, Samuel, 281. 
Parsons, Samuel H., 128, 131, 141. 
Pasteur, Thomas, at Fort Knox, 124. 
Paul, John, 206. 
Paul, John P., 371. 



Paupers, 148. 

Payne, Colonel, 195. 

Pelisipia, 128. 

Penalties, 148. 

Pennington, Dennis, 206, 214, 282. 

People, The, of Indiana, 418, 419. 

Pepper, Abel, 325, 334, 456. 

Perier, M., mentions Vincennes, 19. 

Perry county, settled, 208. 

Peru, 276. 

Peters, Lieut., wounded, 189. 

Petersburg, settled, 205. 

Pettit, Father, 338. 

Pettit, John, 479. 

Peyrode, Ensign Chevalier de la, at 

Ouiatanon. 29. 
Pfrimmer, Samuel, 206. 
Physicians, 432. 
Piankeshaw Indians, friendly to 

Clark, 55; towns raided, 102. 
Pierce, Franklin, 489. 
Pierce, Capt., killed, 197. 
Pierro. Don, captures St. Joseph, 83. 
Pickett, Heathcote, 204. 
Pigeon Roost Massacre, 193. 
Pike county, settled, 205. 
Pine Creek, 187. 
Piqua, 192. 
Piqua Plains, 87. 
Pittsburg, 276. 
Plank roads, 257. 
Plowing, 426. 
Plum creek, 204. 
Point Commerce, 370. 
Political demoralization, 475. 
Politics, 1825 to 1840, 296; 1840 to 

1852, 462-490. 
Polk, James K., 439. 
Polke, Judge William, 259, 316, 321, 

338. 
Polk's Bottom, 208. 
Polypotamia, 128. 
Pontiac's War, 31-37. 
Population, 214, 215, 277. 
Portage Prairie, 329. 
Port Royal Bluffs, 266, 370. 
Posey, Thomas, governor, 162, 206; 

candidate for governor, 250. 
Posey county, settled, 207. 
Pottawattomies, cede land for a 

road, 257, 323, 324, 328, 332, 334. 
Prairie Pottawattomies, 327. 
Presbyterian churches, early, 283, 

285. 
Pride, Woolsey, 205. 
Prince, William, 184. 
Princeton, founded, 208. 
Prior, Abner, 139. 



512 



INDEX 



Proclamation of 1763, 41. 

Proctor, Henry, 192. 

Proctor, John, envoy among Indians, 

112. 
Propliet opposes liquor, 163 ; sketcla, 

182, 183. 
Prophetstown, 183, 189. 
Public Lands, 340. 
Putnam, Rufus, superintendent of 

Indian affairs, 120, 128. 

Quarter Sessions, 146. 
Quebec Act, 44. 
Querez, Pierre, 134. 
Quilting, 426. 

Railroad Charters, 360. 

Randolph, Thomas, killed, 189. 

Randolph county settled, 209. 

Rangers, in War of 1812, 198. 

Raunels, Samuel, 283. 

Rappe, Fi-ederick, 248. 

Rarideu, James, 456. 

Rawley's Mill, 386. 

Ray, James Brown, 302, 309. 

Ray, J. M., 401, note; 416, 436. 

Raymond, David, 223. 

Read, James G., 304, 309, 456. 

Recipes, medical, 433-434. 

Reed, Daniel. 456. 

"Reformers," 285. 

Removal of Indians, 332. 

"Republican"' on upper Wabash, 269. 

Reynolds, David, 440. 

Reynolds. John, 326. 

Rhea, James, 192. 

Richardville, Deroite de, commands 

Vincennes, 45. 
Richmond, laid off, 243. 
Riley, James, 344, 354. 
Riley, Michael, 370. 
Ripley county, 209. 
River ports. 4(X). 
Roach, Addison L., 415. 
Roads, early, 254, 257. 
Robb, David, 214. 
"Robert Hanna" at Indianapolis, 

266. 
Robinson, A. L., 488. 
Robinson, Edmund, 252. 
Robinson. Joseph, 320. 
Robertson, Samuel, 2.83, 284. 
Rocheblave, Philip de. 52. 
Rockport, laid off, 241. 
Rockville, founded, 240. 
Rogers, John, commands "Willing." 

60. 



Rogers, Robert, takes possession ot 
Detroit, 31, 

Rome, founded, 208. 

Ross, A. L. and A. W., 261. 

Ross, John, at Chartres, 40. 

Ross, W. L.. 262. 

Rothschild, Baron, 374. 

Rough and Ready Clubs, 483. 

Russell, A. W., 329. 

Russell, William, 194, 195, 200. 

"Sac Trail," 275, 328. 

"Sacred Beans," 188. 

Salem, laid out, 241. 

Sales of land, amounts. 347. 

Sandusky captured, 32. 

Saratoga, 128. 

Sargent, Winthrop, 131, 150. 

Sauk Indians, 326. 

Saunders, John, guides Clark, 51. 

Scalps, bought by English, 48. 

Schenck, Edwin, 372. 

Schlosser, Ensign, captured, 32. 

Schools, earliest, 249. 

Schrader, John. 281. 

Scott, Charles, attacks Wea towns, 
112; with St. Clair, 116. 

Scott, James, 282. 

Scott, Samuel Thornton, 284. 

Scott, Winfield, 489. 

Scott county, settled, 206. 

Scribner Brothers, 206. 

Scrip, 348. 

Seamans, John B., 483. 

Second principal meridian, 340. 

Second Regiment, 447 seq. 

Seminaries, 178. 

Sering, John, 394. 

Settlements. 13, 203; of New Pur- 
chase, 239-248; of Wabash Coun- 
try, 273. 

Shawnees, 74 visited by Gamelin, 
106; depredations on the Ohio, 
107, 182, 183. 

Shee, John, 133. 

Shelby. Governor, 312. 

Sheriff, 146. 

Shipping i)orts on Ohio river, 240. 

Shockeys, 77. 

Shooting match, 430. 

Shriver, James, 355. 

Sickness. 247 ; among pioneers, 432. 

Sillimau, Willis, 358. 
Silver Heels, a Munsee chief, 197. 
Simcoe, Governor, 123. 
Simpson, Matthew, 436. 
Simrall. Colonel, 194. 
Slavery. 138, 150, 173; a slave code, 
174, 175, 251, 252. 



INDEX 



513 



Small, Jobn, sheriff, 149. 

Smiley, Ross, 456. 

Smith, Caleb B., 368, 476, 480. 

Smith, Jay C, 281. 

Smith, O. H., 322, 375, 469; Whig 
chairman, 474. 

Smith, Thomas L., 415. 

Smith, William, land agent, 133. 

Social life, 418 seq. 

Serin, Father, 293. 

Spanish, active in the west, 83 ; cap- 
ture St. Joseph, 84; invite French 
settlers, 103. 

Specie circular, 347. 403, 404. 

Spencer founded, 209. 

Spencer, John W., 409. 

Spencer, Spier, killed, 189. 

Splunge creeli, 386. 

Spring\'ille, 203. 

Sprinklesburg, laid out, 241. 

St. Ange at Vinceunes, 22. 

St. Clair, Arthur, governor, 99; 
leads expedition, 116-118; de- 
feated, 119; asks court-martial, 
121 ; goes to Illinois, 131, 312. 

St. Clair, Jr., trip to Vinceunes, 143. 

St. Clair county, 156. 

St. Clair, William, 140. 

St. Francis Xavier Church, 279. 

St. Jacques, Miamis at, 17. 

St. Peters. 293. 

Stage lines, 254, 261, 263. 

Stansbury, Howard, 371. 

Stapp, Milton, 475. 

State Bank, First, 233-236; branch- 
es, 233-234. 

State seminary, 291. 

State University, land agent, 214. 

Sterling, Thomas, reaches Illinois, 
41. 

Stewart, William, 409, 410. 

Stevenson, Alexander C, 475, 478. 

Stickuey, B. F., 190. 

Stores, pioneer, 428. 

Storms, Peter. 206. 

"Stubble call," 427. 

Sugar creek, 327. 

Sullivan, General, destroys Iroquois, 
47. 

Sullivan, G. R. C, 223. 

Sullivan, Jeremiah, 239, 308, 311. 
358. 

Sullivan. Thomas L., 442. 

Summers, W. E., 252. 

Supreme court, territorial, 167. 

Survey, 340 seq. 

Sweetser. Philip, 319. 

Switzerland county, settled, 204. 



Symmes, John Cleves, 97; a judge, 

131, 140. 
Sylvania, 128. 

Talbott, H. E., 413. 
Tarke, 124. 

Tarkington, John S., 412. 
Taverns, 429. 

Taxation, Northwest Territory, 147. 
Taylor, Waller, a senator, 223; cen- 
sured, 253. 
Taylor, Zachary, at Fort Harrison, 

193, 195, 196, 200 ; in Mexico, 441, 

445, 447. 
Tecumseh, opposes liquor, 164; 

sketch, 182; at Vinceunes, 184 j 

killed, 201. 
Temperance society, Indiana, 287. 
Terre Coupee, 329. 
Terre Haute, 126, 186, 209; 240, 241; 

land oflace, 343. 
Test, Charles, 318, 456, 480. 
Test, John, 223; injured, 263. 
Texas, 438 ; Independence of, 440 ; in 

campaign of 1844, 473. 
Thom, Allen D., 223. 
Thomas, Jesse B., 169. 
Thompson, John T., 286. 
Thompson, R. W., 319, 480, 488. 
"Thompsoniaus," 434. 
Three per cent fund, 254, 255. 
Tippecanoe, campaign of, 186-190; 

county, 274 ; celebration, 313. 
Tipton, John, 199-201; founds Lo- 

gansport, 274, 307, 311, 323, 324, 

331, 336. 
Tipton, Spier S., 442. 
Todd, John, appointed governor of 

Illinois, 67. 
Traces, early, 246. 
Traders, licensed, 10. 
Trail, Vinceunes, 159 ; travelers on, 

180. 
Travel, pioneer, 429. 
Treaties, Indian, 163. 
Treaty Grounds, 323. 
"Triton," 265. 

Trotter, Colonel, quarrels with Har- 
din, 108. 
Truman, Major Alexander, sent 

among Indians, killed, 120. 
Turner, George, a judge, 139, 140. 
Twelve Mile Purchase. 210, 
Twightwees, (see Miamis), 
Twin Lake Mission, 335. 

University, Vinceunes, 176; town- 
ship of land donated, 177, 292. 



514 



INDEX 



Vaile. Rawson, 483. 

Vallouia, center of ranger service, 
199-201; 209. 

Vance, Samuel, 204, 275. 344. 

Vanderburg, Henry, 136, 139, 140, 
149, 167. 

Vandeveer, Joel, 370. 

Varnum, James M., a judge, 131. 

Vaudreuil, 16. 

Vaud, Canton, 204. 

Vawter, Jesse, 206. 

Vawter, John, 314, 316, 321. 

Vermillion Towns, attacked by 
Clark, 95. 

Vermillion Sea, 4. 

Vevay, settled, 204, 248. 

Vigilance Committee, 299. 

Vigo, Francis, assists Clark, 57, 136, 
137, 145, 184. 

Vigus. C, stage line, 262. 

Vigus, Jordan, 316, 324. 

Villiers. Neyon de, leaves Illinois, 
40, 45. 

Vincennes, mentioned. 19, 20, 21 ; 
settlement of, 21 ; cliurch records, 
23 ; land grant. 23 ; commons, 23- 
24; Croghan at, 37; captured by 
Clark's men, 54; recaptured by 
British. 55; taken by Clark, 59- 
67 ; in 17.S8, 98 ; land claim, 132 ; 
condition in 1790, 137 ; population, 
155: land office. 160, 167, 179; 
capital, 210, 211; turnpike, 364, 
370. 

Vincennes, Francois Morgane de, at 
Ouiatanon, 18; at Vincennes, 20; 
death, 20. 

Vincennes, Sieur de, among the Mi- 
amis, 16; died, 17. 

Virginia Cession. 127. 

Virginia conquers the Northwest, 
47 ; organizes government, 67. 

Viviat. Louis, 132. 

Vivier, Louis, at Vincennes, 21, 30. 



"Wabash, home of Miamis, 77, 307. 

Wabash and Erie Canal, 355; land 
donated for, 356. .359, 364; com- 
pletion of, 378; failure of, 390- 
393. 

Wabash Land Company, 43. 

Walker, William, 442. 

Walker. Jacob, 328, 329. 

Wallace, David, 336, 369, 456. 

Wallace, James H., stage owner, 262. 

Wallace, Lew, 442. 

Walpole, Thomas D., 456. 



Walpole Company, 43. 

W^ar with Miamis, 101, 104-125; of 
1812, 203. 

Warrick, Jacob, killed, 189. 

Warrick county, settled, 206. 

Washington, George, Indian policy, 
102. 

Washington, 128, 239. 

Washington county, settled, 207. 

Watrin, Francais Philibert, wrote 
^ about Vincennes, 21. 

Watts, Edward, 371. ■^"' )/ 

Watts, John Sebrie, 370. JJ 

Wayne, Anthony. 122-125, 181. 

Wayne county, old, 156 ; new, 157. 

Wayne county, 199. 

Weas. visited by Gamelin, 105; 
town destroyed, 113; sends dele- 
gates for peace, 120, 324. 

Weddings, 431. 

Wells, Samuel, 186, 194. 

Western Company owns Illinois, 22. 

Western Eagle, founded, 206. 

Western Sim, criticises Jennings, 
217. 

Whetzell's Trace, 243. 

Whig speakers in 1840, 319 note; 
measures in 1841, 463; organiza- 
tion in 1844, 471; last campaign, 
484. 

Whipping. 148, 149. 

Whitcomb, James. 322, 470, 471, 474, 
477, 483. 

White, Albert S., 476. 

White. Isaac, killed, 189. 

Whitewater Valley, in Indiana, 159; 
settlement, 160 ; dissatisfaction in, 
173: survey of, 355, 362; canal, 
364, 375. 

White Oak Springs, 205. 

Whitlock. Ambrose. 241. 243. 

Wildcat creek, ambuscade. 196, 200. 

Wiley, Allen. 281. 

Wilkinson. James, 113; attacks 
Kethtipecanunc, 114 ; leads expe- 
dition, 114-115. 

Willard, Ashbel P., 488. 

Wlllard, William, 436. 

Williams, Jesse L., 359, 366, 369, 
371, 372. 

Williams, John, commands Fort 
Gage, 55. 

Williams, Jonathan, 262. 

Williams, William, 488. 

Williamson, David, destroys Morav- 
ian towns, 86. 

Williamsport, 276. 

Wilmot Proviso, 486. 



INDEX 



515 



Wilson, John, land agent, 133. 
Wilson, John, opens stage line, 261. 
Wilson, Thomas, 206. 
Winamac, Indian chief, 191. 
Winamac, land office, 201, 344. 
Winans, William, 281. 
Winchester, James, 195. 
Wingate, Hiram, 206. 
Wolf, Jacob, 264. 
Woodburn, John, 366. 
Wright, John, 285. 



Wright, John W., 485. 

Wright, Joseph A., 390, 410, 412, 

413, 470, 477, 479, 485, 486, 489. 
Wyandots, 72, 184. 
Wylie, Alex, 312. 
Wyllys, John, 101. 

"Yellow Jackets," flag of, 321. 

Zeigler, David, 97. 
Zenor, John, 320. 



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